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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23286658">l’esprit de l’escalier</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekwill/pseuds/seekwill'>seekwill</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Good Omens (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Romantic Comedy, Amélie AU, Love at First Sight, M/M, No Apocalypse, Soft Aziraphale (Good Omens), the divergence is literally within the first 5 seconds of the TV show</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 10:35:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>24,057</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23286658</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/seekwill/pseuds/seekwill</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>l’esprit de l’escalier: that feeling you get when you leave a conversation and think of all the things you should have said</i>
</p><p>With his books and his clothes and other curiosities he’d collected since beginning his time in London, Aziraphale considered himself a curator of beautiful things. He found beauty in people too, in the way they moved and spoke and laughed. </p><p>This man, who was very nearly past him now, almost gone, shook him. He couldn’t understand why. There was an impulse to reach out, to wrap his blunt fingers around the man’s skinny wrist on his handlebars, say “Hello there, might you have a moment to explore why I’ve fallen in love with you just now?”</p><p>
  <i>An adaptation of Jean-Pierre Jeunet's 2001 film Amélie, as part of the GO Romantic Comedy Event</i>
</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>383</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>616</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Good Omens Rom Com Event, Ixnael’s Recommendations, Our Own Side</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. La Valse d’Aziraphale</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>With apologies to Jean-Pierre Jeunet.</p><p>This story has been lovingly beta'd by two of my favourite people, TheKnittingJedi and Mussimm. Many thanks to the crew over at the GO Events discord, who really are a spectacular bunch.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>On April 18, 2003, the existence of Aziraphale, Principality, (former) guardian of the Eastern Gate shifted on its very axis. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On April 18, 2003, Aziraphale, Principality, (former) guardian of the Eastern Gate returned to Earth for the first time in some 6000 years. Heaven had asked for a volunteer to be their man on the ground in the British Isles and Aziraphale had raised his hand, hopeful. Where the previous agent had gone, he hadn’t asked. He had made it a habit to not ask those sorts of questions. He had made it a habit, over the last several millennia, to stay out of trouble as much as an angel could.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He’d had his first taste of Earth during a brief, notably unsuccessful stint on the walls of the garden of Eden. There, he’d overseen the fall of man and also ‘misplaced’ a sword that also happened to be on fire, all in the span of one day. Not his finest hour, he would readily admit. After the incidents he had been demoted, relegated to pushing paper in the Department of Miracles.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>That was where he had been, more or less, until April 18, 2003, when the Archangel Gabriel circulated a memo asking if anyone would be interested in a change of scenery. Aziraphale was. He was, as far as he knew, the only one who inquired about the position.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He watched Earth as it changed, had learned about remarkable humans from the records of miracles that passed his desk. He knew that humans prayed for health, both for themselves and others, for rewards for hard work done, for money (so much money). They prayed, in endless ways, for love. What a special thing it must be, he thought, that so much energy was spent wishing for it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>From April 18, 2003 forward, Aziraphale had taken residence in London’s Soho - a central location, well situated to more conveniently access locations for miracles and blessings, as required. He had opened a book shop as a way, he explained to Head Office, to integrate, to build a convincing cover. He had also cultivated a taste for small and earthly pleasures.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale liked the curved indent the edge of a spoon left in chocolate mousse; the gilded page edges in antique hardcover books; the crease in his shirt sleeves when he picked them up from the dry cleaners. As an angel, there was no material need for him to eat food meant for humanity or have his clothes professionally laundered, but there was something about being in their world, living as one of them, that made him feel more at home. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He had also developed a laundry list of earthborn items and phenomena that he did not care for. Chief among these were the unflattering glow of fluorescent lights, and the screech of cutlery scraping across a plate.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But in spite of these minor annoyances, Aziraphale found himself altogether quite taken with the world he now lived in. He had expected to like it. He’d like anything after 6000 years of an efficient but chilly workplace, short and meaningless exchanges over the water cooler, and nothing, absolutely nothing of softness or warmth. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He had not expected to </span>
  <em>
    <span>love</span>
  </em>
  <span> it. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There was Love in Heaven. Official Love, that concerned itself with bestowing Grace and God’s Will. There was nothing of the love that was birthed and nurtured by humankind. That love was quieter, less showy, and it permeated everything around him as he walked down the London streets. He witnessed it when he saw people offer their seats and hold doors on the underground, watched as tourists wrote on the backs of postcards and slipped them into red boxes for those who didn’t make the journey. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He saw it in tangled hands and the press of lips to skin on a late Saturday evening on the pavement outside his shop and flat. Frantic and wanting and weighted. But he was only an observer.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He wanted to be more.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale had always known, from the moment he was formed with ethereal hands and placed in the cosmos as a protector, as a warrior, that he was a different sort. He </span>
  <em>
    <span>wanted</span>
  </em>
  <span>. What exactly he wanted, he wasn’t entirely sure. When he tried to broach this subject with other angels he was met with blank expressions, a change of subject. So this want buzzed around his ears like a fly he couldn’t swat away, until he came earthside. Then he realized.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ah, love.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He remembered the first time he had shaken someone’s hand, had touched another person’s body with his own. May, 2004. He had set out to meet a man about a book, a misprinted bible, a remarkable thing. He had held it in his hands, felt the smooth leather cover, smelled the dank must that emanated from it, and agreed to purchase it, to bring it home with him. The man had smiled and extended his hand. Aziraphale had known this was a ritual of theirs, and thought, </span>
  <em>
    <span>well, when in Rome</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The touch, which to the man appeared to be routine and unremarkable, set explosions off in Aziraphale’s mind. The warmth of someone else’s skin. The silken tenderness of someone else’s palm. It was as if he’d been struck by some brutal, beautiful force. He was lit up, all of him, as bright and beating as the day he had been made.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It would not do, he came to understand, to isolate himself should he be on earth for any length of time. He had found since arriving, that the number of blessings and miracles he’d been tasked with were minimal. He’d go weeks without hearing from Heaven. In the meantime, would it hurt to maybe </span>
  <em>
    <span>live</span>
  </em>
  <span> in this world, alongside working in it?</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In 2006, he walked into La Courage, the bistro-pub and sometimes spiritual parlour that sat kitty-corner from his shop. It was run under the watchful eye of Madame Tracy of Soho (previously Marjorie Potts of Newcastle upon Tyne) and in her acquaintance, his existence changed once more. Madame Tracy offered a warm cup of tea, an adequate croque monsieur, and was the first human to express any sort of genuine interest in Aziraphale’s life. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Over the years he had learned that Madame Tracy liked the feeling of having shuffled cards in such a way that they slid together perfectly and without resistance. She did not like when the gentlemen who delivered the kegs parked in front of the bistro, instead of using the alley.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And so began his full immersion. He heard from Heaven less and less frequently as the years passed, and found himself less and less concerned with matters of state and so-called holy men than with the affairs of his neighbours and fellow regulars of La Courage. He would listen to them speak, observe their habits and comings and goings. In 2007 he performed his first unsanctioned miracle, repairing the bicycle tire of the young man who worked at the newsstand who always wished Aziraphale a good morning, and waited for a reprimand from Heaven to arrive.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It never did. This, for Aziraphale, served as permission to do it again. His second unsanctioned miracle was when the young American woman who now lived in the flat on the second landing moved in, and she asked for help bringing up her things from the pavement. Aziraphale, in spite of his past as a Warrior of God, was not much keen on physical exertion, and incredibly, the lad who worked for the landlord, a young Mr. Pulsifer, showed up at just that moment and was more than happy to help Aziraphale’s new neighbour move her things in. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>(Mr. Newton Pulsifer liked computers. Computers did not like Mr. Pulsifer.)</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Again, no warning or admonishment from anyone Upstairs ever made its way to him. From that point forward, he was considerably less shy.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>His miracles weren’t flashy. They did not insist upon themselves or demand local news coverage. There were no crying statues or silhouettes of the Virgin Mary appearing in the side of glass office buildings. They simply made life a little easier for the humans he had come to know and care about. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In Heaven he had been advised to take care with humans. They were regarded as God’s favoured creatures in the way a young child has a favourite animal at the zoo. They were meant to be observed and admired, but not interacted with in any sort of meaningful way. But Aziraphale couldn’t help himself. Humans were compelling and inventive and funny and brilliant. They had bright eyes and easy smiles. They loved. They made things he came to love. Like books, for instance.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The aforementioned obsession with books began as a more aesthetic pleasure. He enjoyed the way that the spines looked lined up on a shelf, the way they stacked one on top of another on every surface of his shop as he acquired more. Then it was the smell, then the sensation of the turning page, the smoothness of the paper. Finally, he discovered the stories that lay inside.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Yes, humans were remarkable creatures.They imagined things that had not happened, created realities that did not exist, and put them to page to share to others. They spoke to one another over the distance of time and space because beautiful worlds lived inside of them and they could not bear to hold them back. Every sentence they wrote was a gift. Each cover he cracked open felt like Christmas morning. It was so much like dreaming.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Dreaming had always been Aziraphale’s problem. Angel’s didn’t dream. Why would one spin fancies and falsehoods when one lived in Heaven? He always had, though. His mind would wander, tumble over </span>
  <em>
    <span>what ifs</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Now these stories, his very life on earth facilitated a renaissance of daydreams. His books, his neighbours, the possibility of touch and kindness and the mere proximity of love provided endless fodder and fuel.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He steeped in gratitude for these dreams, these private constructions of endless possibilities. Most of all when it came to love. Because while he could read about it, see it happening and live next to it, Aziraphale would always be on the edge. Human lives seemed so precarious, so fleeting. To love them, really love a single one of them in the way his heart ached to would be inviting pain in, would be to invite questions he could never answer. To try his hand at love with another angel? Out of the question. A surefire guarantee of mockery and ostracization.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale would read the books. He would allow sidelong glances at the lovers hand in hand in Hyde Park. He would go to the cinema and watch a film where the hero and heroine kissed and sacrificed everything for one another. And that, that would be enough.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>It was blue hour. The city descended into nighttime colours and Aziraphale was returning from the off-license, a bottle of Bordeaux recommended to him by the handsome lad with the nice smile who worked there on Thursday afternoons was clutched in his fist. Aziraphale made a point to visit every week. The young man would have a recommendation at the ready, would sometimes already have it sat by the till for him. Waiting for him to arrive.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The lad would smile that lovely smile and greet Aziraphale warmly. He’d flirt a little, and while Aziraphale had been around long enough now to distinguish genuine interest from being humoured (these Thursday evening exchanges being the latter), he appreciated the interaction all the same. It was nice to skirt on the edge of love. To pretend there was a suggestion of it. Harmless play acting.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It only hurt a little, that these types of small exchanges would always be the end of it. It only stung for a short time.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He stood at the street corner, the bottle of wine held tight to his chest in the late winter chill, when amongst the rush hour traffic he heard someone holler. He looked up the street along with the pedestrians that waited with him for their chance to cross. A bike messenger was weaving through the slow moving cars, going in the opposite direction of traffic which had prompted drivers to release a volley of aggressive honking. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale watched as the man slipped between the cars like they were nothing, obstacles to be disregarded on his way to something better. He was all limbs and long lines. He wasn’t, Aziraphale tutted, wearing a helmet. He was smiling.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Seeing the man’s unabashed and unselfconscious smile made Aziraphale’s heart lurch. Deep red hair and high cheekbones. His eyebrows arched over a pair of stylish sunglasses.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With his books and his clothes and other curiosities he’d collected since beginning his time in London, Aziraphale considered himself a collector of beautiful things. He found beauty in people too, in the way they moved and spoke and laughed. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale could feel his lips part, the sharp intake of air he inhaled as the man closed in on him. A car in the intersection turned right and the combination of the driver not looking and the cyclist being very much not where he should have been brought the car and the bike perilously close.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>This man, who was very nearly past him now, almost gone, shook him. He couldn’t understand why. There was an impulse to reach out, to wrap his blunt fingers around the man’s skinny wrist on his handlebars, say “Hello there, might you have a moment to explore why I’ve fallen in love with you just now?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Jesus Christ,” muttered the man standing beside Aziraphale, eyes drawn up from his phone. “Fucking bike couriers.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The cyclist extended one long leg and booted the side of the BMW. “Watch it!” he yelled, as he expertly swerved around it. As he did his bike leaned to the side, and in the correcting of it, a pannier bag on the back wheel shook loose. It landed without ceremony at Aziraphale’s feet. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale knelt to pick it up and meant to call out to the man on the bike, but his voice faltered as the man and the bike disappeared around a corner. There was no way Aziraphale could catch up with him. He was strong, yes, not nimble though, not quick. Should he run after the man, his corporation would be struggling with breath before he could say ‘tickety-boo.’</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The bag was heavy, and he shifted to balance it against his chest. The people around him began their journey over the crosswalk. The traffic signal had changed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, dear,” Aziraphale murmured, looking at the bag, wondering what was inside. Wondering how desperately it would be missed. He couldn’t leave it where it had fallen for the man to retrace his steps. Someone else would scoop it up and take it away. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He raised his eyes to the place the cyclist had disappeared, and willed him to return. In these spare moments he allowed his tender mind to descend into fantasy. The man would come back, he’d take the bag, their fingers would slide over one another. He’d thank Aziraphale and ask about the wine and Aziraphale would be bold and ask if he wouldn’t be interested in splitting the bottle. Oh, and then -</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“‘Scuse me!” A woman pressed past him, rolling her eyes. “Middle of the bloody crosswalk,” she muttered, shooting daggers with her eyes in his direction.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She was right. He was being an obstruction. And he was being terribly silly. And the man hadn’t come back.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale sighed, and held the bag and his wine a little tighter. He’d just have to find him. How hard could it be for an angel to track one human man down?</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>(It should be noted that Aziraphale had had one warm encounter on earth prior to his demotion. On the wall of the garden, a black serpent, the being responsible for Eve's lips on that Apple, had coiled at Aziraphale's bare feet and looked up at him with golden eyes. And, of all things, they'd had a very nice chat under his wing while it rained the first rain. When the rain had subsided, the serpent slithered back down the wall, never to be seen again.) </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. La Valse des monstres</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Crowley pulled up in front of the shop and swung his leg over the crossbar of his bicycle. The smile was still etched on his face, the sensation and satisfaction of having landed a good kick to that BMW that had run the red lingering in his joints. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley disliked BMW drivers, on principle. Disliked a lot of things, actually. Didn’t like the Shard, ugly thing. Hated when his phone didn’t get signal right away when coming out of the underground. Despised when people tried to return merchandise to the shop that had clearly been used. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>To balance it out he liked cracking his neck, feeling the braille bumps on public signage, and those seasonal affective disorder lamps that everyone was on about these days. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He leaned the bicycle up against the shop and looked to his back wheel when he realized —</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh no. No no no no no.” His bag was gone, and his smile was too. He turned back from where he’d come from, but the street was clear. No large nylon pannier bag that had bounced off. He looked back to his bike and mentally retraced his ride. Bethnal Green to Shoreditch. Shoreditch past the Barbican. Then down to the Embankment just for kicks then up to Soho. It had been a smooth ride, pleasant and free of pedestrians stepping into his path (not that they ever did. One look at Crowley and they were inspired to steer clear). No problems at all, except his little run-in with Mr. BMW 8 Series Coupé.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Where he had just about gone sideways on the road, but had miraculously brought himself upright at the last minute. His pannier must have come off at that point. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You had one job,” Crowley muttered to the bag, wherever it was. “All you had to do was stay on the fecking cycle.” He hopped back on his bicycle and pedaled back the way he’d come. He’d gone halfway across London for the contents of that bag, no way he was going to write it off. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>When he reached the scene of where he was sure he’d lost it, there was no sign of the bag. He stood on the pavement, clutching his handlebars and craning his neck in every which way. He hoped someone had propped it up somewhere, but that didn’t appear to be the case. It was gone. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In its place was a strange energy, some buzz in the air that left the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. It smelled like electricity, like a very small but powerful localized lightning storm had descended upon the intersection just moments earlier. It was warmer, more humid than the surrounding area. It was almost as if…</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>No. It was nothing. He was just steamed and imagining things.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With a heavy sigh he rode back to the shop. He wondered if whoever found it would try to resell the contents. He’d have to look online to see if anything popped up in buy and sell listings for Central London. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On his ride back he swore at cars, at other cyclists, at himself. Stupid, losing everything the day he’d finally got them. He hopped off his bike again, left it against the front window, and slammed his way into the shop.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“What’s got your knickers in a twist?” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Dagon was leaning over the glass counter, flipping through a magazine. Her ice blue eyes raked Crowley’s agitated frame, but the expression on her face didn’t change.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Lost my bag,” said Crowley, giving a half-hearted kick to the display cabinet that held a selection of leather and polyurethane harnesses.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Ah ha,” said Dagon, attention turning back to the rag in front of her. “Stupid of you.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley shot her a dark look and lurched to the back of the shop, sweeping through the beaded curtain into the Employees Only area.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The shop was a front. Or, sort of a front. They did bring in a little money from it on the odd month (February), but most of all it served as a kind of show piece if Hell ever came ringing. </span>
  <em>
    <span>This shop</span>
  </em>
  <span>, they’d say, </span>
  <em>
    <span>tempts people into lust</span>
  </em>
  <span>. But Hell never came ringing. Hadn’t come ringing for decades at this point, but paranoia was part of being a demon, so they kept it running, seven days a week, even holidays and late, late nights. They did special deliveries in emergencies, should one find oneself in a sticky situation, and in need of some water-based lube or bondage tape (or both).</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Hastur sat at one end of the beat up couch in the employee lounge, watching some cricket game on the cruddy tube TV in the corner. Ligur was slumped over at the other end, stirring as Crowley noisily poured himself a cup of cold, bad coffee. It warmed up with a thought, but Crowley left the taste unaltered, wanting the bitter taste to coat his tongue and be some sort of minor punishment for losing the bag.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Whassa matter with you? Clanging about,” slurred Ligur, pulling himself from his nap.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Me? What’s the matter with you two dossers? Should be helping Dag out front.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Hastur opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by Dagon yelling from her place by the till. “He lost his cycle bag!”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, your treasure,” said Hastur sarcastically. He leaned dramatically to the side in order to see the television around Crowley.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Shut up,” said Crowley, though his reprimand lacked any true heat. He stared into the dregs of coffee grounds swirling at the bottom of his mug and sneered. He wished he could just… track it. What good was having occult powers if you couldn’t even use them to track things? Witches could do homing and tracking spells. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Human</span>
  </em>
  <span> witches. But not demons, no. Have powers to perform all sorts of incredible miracles but the Almighty saw to it from day zero that creatures like him would never be able to use them to find the keys to his flat, let alone a bag filled with things he’d been looking for for years and had just managed to track down the manual way.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The bell over the front door rang out and Dagon called back, “Delivery! Can one of you freeloaders get out here and help me?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Using the arm of the couch and Ligur’s knee, Hastur levered himself up and walked out to the front.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“What’re you going to do ‘bout your bag?” asked Ligur, sitting up and wiping sleep from his eyes.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley poured a second cup of coffee, warmed it, and passed it over to his colleague. “Dunno,” he said, shrugging. Ligur accepted the mug, and said nothing in return. “Figure something out, I guess.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Demons weren’t supposed to be friends, but being on earth as long as they all had, lines tended to get a bit blurry. Being friends with humans was challenging given the whole mortality business, but existence could be a lonely thing and so the four of them had found themselves drawn together. Crowley had been on earth the longest, since the garden days, Hastur was assigned a few millennia later with Ligur on his tail, and finally Dagon was the baby, having shown up in time to incite a calamity or two in Mary Tudor’s court.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Though she was the youngest, the shop had been Dagon’s idea, and it took a little convincing to bring the others on board. But really, Crowley thought now, it had been a stroke of genius. Love Shop &amp; Cinema (though the cinema was now defunct, too messy) had been operational on the edge of Soho from 1967 onwards. It had never occurred to any of the neighbours to find it odd that the four employees had remained exactly the same for decades, a few controversial hairstyles on Crowley’s part the only notable exception. They were not bothered by health inspectors or tax men. They had no permit or license to operate. They had never paid a shilling of rent.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The comradery these close quarters inspired was a strange and sometimes uneasy one, but it was the closest thing Crowley had ever had to a family. In spite of his well-appointed flat in Mayfair, he spent the great majority of his time at the shop beside Dagon, Hastur, and Ligur, pricing items, researching the most technologically advanced vibrators to order for their shelves, and giving confused and embarrassed tourists directions to the Oxford Circus Underground Station.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It was an okay sort of existence. With six millennia under his belt he had very nearly seen it all, but the kind-of-friendship he now had gave another layer of meaning to his days. There was a certain ache though, that lingered inside of him. A hollow spot that had grown as the centuries passed. Some days he could ignore it, keep himself distracted enough so that the ache dulled to almost nothing. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But then a couple would come in, fingers threaded together, giggling at the wares available. Dagon always helped couples, her straightforward and factual approach seemed to bring a welcome professionalism to the proceedings. Crowley would sit behind the counter and watch them from the corners of his golden eyes.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He’d look at their hands, the ways their shoulders would bump together by accident but not by accident at all, shy little glances at each others’ bashful faces. It was pathetic. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He wanted it so badly it gave him a headache.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He’d been with humans, mostly wanting to see what the big fuss was about initially. Back when Hell still issued directives, he’d have to do the occasional lust-based temptation to meet a quota. But mostly, humans failed to keep his interest. They’d never know what he knew. It wasn’t just about being touched. It was about being understood.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On two occasions, he’d attempted an extended dalliance with a member of God’s favoured creatures. Once in 1245, then a second time in 1677. Something about pink cheeks and blue eyes and wind tousled blond curls of both rendezvous’ rang a bell inside Crowley’s hollow spot, suggested it could be filled up. He had no idea why. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>(He knew exactly why.) </span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale entered the lobby of his building. By the mailboxes lay a package addressed to Unit 1. Rather clumsily, he scooped it up in his arms and carried it with the bicycle bag and the bottle of wine up to the landing. He laid it, as gingerly as he could, in front of the door to flat number one and gave a very light rap with his knuckles just below the brass number there. Then he continued his ascent.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As he reached his own door, the sound of a door creaking open from one floor below rose to where he stood, and he smiled to himself.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Thank you, Mr. Fell,” called the quiet voice, before the door closed again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You’re welcome, my dear,” he whispered. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He had not seen the face of the American woman in flat number one since the day she had moved in two years prior. He had never heard her come or go, but sometimes when he passed her door on his way out, he would hear a small voice from behind him say: “Good morning, Mr. Fell”. He never turned around quickly enough to catch her. All he saw was her closed door.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As if by magic (because it was, sort of), the door to his flat opened in front of him, and shut behind him once he was safely inside without him laying a finger on it. He left the wine in the kitchen, but he held fast to the bag.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He settled into his favourite armchair, a cozy tartan one worn in spots from nights spent reading every book he could get his hands on and drinking endless cups of tea. There was no tea now, nor books. Just this stranger’s bag laid flat in his lap.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He was not snooping, he told himself, listening to the rip of the velcro as he lifted the flap. Perhaps there would be some sort of identification inside that would help him locate the owner with the wide smile and strong legs. With a reverence not typically afforded to a filthy pannier, Aziraphale undid the zipper and looked inside.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Records. Several of them. Ten, perhaps. He checked on either side of them but there was nothing else. No wallet or receipt he could use to track down the owner. No clues to work with. He paused a moment, tapping his fingers on the bag. Maybe, he thought, the records would help.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He pulled one out using the tips of his fingers, not wanting to scratch or damage the cover in any way. The record wasn’t new, not by human standards anyway, showing the slightest bit of wear on the corners. On the cover was a group of young people sitting on a sofa in the middle of a stark white room. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>No need to argue</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” said Aziraphale to the empty room, reading the title on the front. “The Cranberries.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Since taking his position on earth, he’d come to like the music humans made. Well, some of it. It didn’t take much to be better than the so called celestial harmonies that were inescapable on Heaven’s side. In his cultural explorations he’d become quite attached to Chopin and Brahms, though he’d happily take anything the London Symphony felt fit to play. He’d gone frequently over the years, by himself, of course. He loved the melodies, he loved discreetly glancing at the faces of the people in his row, to see how they transformed under the conductor’s ministrations.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>This didn’t look like classical music though. It was obviously something a bit more contemporary. What were they calling it? Bebop? No.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale was struck, very suddenly, by the need to hear this record, wondering if in the listening, he would discover his next steps into finding the man who had lost it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He crossed to the dusty record player, left behind by a former tenant. If Aziraphale had been concerned that the forty-some-odd year-old record player was broken, perhaps it would’ve been, but the thought never occurred to him and so it turned on as he lifted the cover, and carefully placed the record on the turntable. He dropped the needle in a random spot on the spinning vinyl and a woman’s mournful voice flooded the room.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Put your hands in my hands<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>And come with me<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>We'll find another end<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>And my head, and my head<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>On anyone's shoulder<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Cause I can't be with you </span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It wasn’t what he had expected, though he hadn’t known what to expect. It wasn’t what he himself would have chosen. More spirited than he was used to. But, it wasn’t bad. Not at all, in fact.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He returned to the bag and retrieved another record. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>The Velvet Underground,</span>
  </em>
  <span>” he read aloud. A poetic sort of name. He let the woman finish singing, and switched the records, dropping the needle randomly, the same ritual as before.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Thought of you as my mountaintop<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Thought of you as my peak<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Thought of you as everything<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>I've had, but couldn't keep<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Linger on your pale blue eyes</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale imagined the man listening to these records, wondered what lyrics found a home inside of him, which key change made his heart somersault. These must be special things, Aziraphale thought, to carry them around with you. The man would be missing them.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As the second song came to a close, Aziraphale extracted and examined one more record. The profile of a serious young man in black and white confronted him from the cover. He switched the records once more.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Haven't had a dream in a long time<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>See, the life I've had<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Can make a good man bad<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>So for once in my life<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Let me get what I want<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Lord knows, it would be the first time</span>
  </em>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>(When the serpent had coiled around the angel’s ankle, had seen the fair hair dusting over the skin pulled taut over the bone there, he had expected the angel to pull away. He was there to cause trouble, obviously. But the angel hadn’t pulled away at all. He’d looked down with startling blue eyes and had said, of all things, “Hello.”)</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Si tu n'étais pas là</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>He stayed up the whole night and listened to each of the records. Some of them were by musicians he’d heard of, but most he hadn’t. Each time he dropped the pin it was some kind of gift, even if it wasn’t exactly to his normal tastes. Through the words that spilled from the record player, he’d begun to paint a portrait of the man to whom this series of pressed vinyl belonged.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The melody and rhythm of some songs matched the violent and carefree bravado that Aziraphale had witnessed as the man whipped between vehicles and lashed out at obstacles. But the others presented a wholly different image, something quieter and more internal. This was a man who longed for something he did not have, who felt it deeply. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>A kindred</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Aziraphale thought. Or perhaps that was wishful thinking on his part. He didn’t want it to be.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>I know you</span>
  </em>
  <span>, Aziraphale would say to the man when they finally stood in front of one another. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I heard you in those songs and I know who you are. Do you feel on the outside of all this? Do you feel like perhaps the world doesn’t quite understand you in the way you want it to? You’re an observer, you’ve a keen eye for the intricacies of this world and I do too. We could watch the world together, don’t you think? And maybe this want that aches in my chest and yours too will find another home</span>
  </em>
  <span>. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But first he had to find him. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The next morning, after tea and eggs and toast, he decided he would head in the direction of the library and perhaps look for record stores in the general area. Maybe the man would be a frequent customer at one, enough that Aziraphale could describe him to a record store clerk — “tall, ginger, good on a bike, devastatingly handsome” — and the clerk would know him just from that, and would give Aziraphale the next clue he needed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He descended down the stairs, the bag of records carefully reassembled and snug in his arms. He was nearly down to the postboxes when he heard a quiet voice from the landing.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell, are you okay?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He turned to see Ms. Device’s door open a crack, and a thin sliver of her face was backlit there, glasses low on her nose and hair tumbled over her forehead. What a lovely surprise. “Yes, my dear. I’m very well. Why do you ask?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She chuckled and looked down at the floor, then back to him. “You were listening to the Cranberries for a long time last night. My experience is that when a person listens to the Cranberries for a long time that they’re usually </span>
  <em>
    <span>going through it</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” The last few words were pronounced with a weighted, knowing significance.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s cheeks reddened. He hadn’t realized how loud the music had been. “I’m so sorry for the disruption.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Don’t be. It was nice. Sometimes it’s nice to feel like you’re going through it together.” With that, she closed the door, and Aziraphale continued out onto the pavement.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In just a few short steps in the direction of the library, he encountered Newton Pulsifer and his employer, the landlord, Mr. Ross-Hampton. Aziraphale had engineered his life to have as few interactions with Mr. Ross-Hampton as possible, and pitied the humans who did not have the same tools at their disposal. At present, the landlord was berating Newt, there on the sidewalk in broad daylight for some task he had failed to complete, or had completed but not to Mr. Ross-Hampton’s standards. It was difficult to tell. Regardless, it made Aziraphale bristle.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Newt could be a bit clumsy at times, occasionally accident prone, but Aziraphale had always found him a pleasant and gentle young man. To intervene on Mr. Pulsifer’s behalf would likely be to embarrass him, Aziraphale knew. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There was also nothing the angel could do to shame Mr. Ross-Hampton, as Mr. Ross-Hampton was not a person who felt shame, as was often the case for people for whom that emotional experience would be most helpful.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As Aziraphale passed, his lips curved into an expression of distaste and he had to look away from the scene. When he did, his eyes landed on a slick and shining Tesla, parked there at the curb, instantly recognizable as the landlord’s treasured vehicle. Aziraphale had seen the landlord driving it in the past, pulling up on to the sidewalks, and disregarding pedestrian signals. As he walked by, an idea occurred to him, and a secret smile took residence on his face.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He let his hand drop and his fingers glided over the sparkling paint on the hood of the Tesla. As he drew his hand away, the engine fell clean out of the car and landed with an unceremonious thud on the road beneath it. Aziraphale cleared his throat, straightened his spine, and walked forward, looking to his path ahead.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“What in the… what in God’s name?” he heard Mr. Ross-Hampton cry from behind him. </span>
  <em>
    <span>What in God’s name</span>
  </em>
  <span>, indeed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On his way to the library, Aziraphale had to pass through the very same intersection where he’d recovered the bag just yesterday. Upon his approach, something caught his eye. In fact, several somethings caught his eye. On every lamp post and utility box and store window were multi-coloured flyers displaying a handwritten message.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>LOST<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Black pannier bag<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>Vinyl records inside<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>REWARD IF RETURNED<br/></span>
  </em>
  <em>
    <span>NO QUESTIONS ASKED</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And a phone number. Aziraphale pulled one of the flyers down, and turned abruptly on his heels back to his home. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He didn’t go all the way up to his flat upon his return, but instead chose to go into his shop, where he hadn’t been since yesterday at lunch time. As he closed the door behind him he turned the sign on the window to indicate he was open. For appearances, of course. One couldn’t always be closed. He weaved his way through the stacks of books and settled himself behind his desk. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Delicately, he placed the bag down on the desk in front of him, then smoothed out the bright pink flyer on top. It had been hastily made and photocopied. It was still sticky with the paste that had held it to the lamp post. Freshly put up. The man must be eager to get his records back. Must not be too far away.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale put his hand on the receiver of his phone. All he had to do was dial the number on the flyer, and that would connect him to the man on the bike. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Hello,” he said to himself, rehearsing. “I saw your flyer and I was in the area and…” No. He’d go off on a tangent. He took a deep breath and started again. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Hello, I have something that belongs to you.” Yes, that ought to do it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The bell above the shop door rang, and a man walked in. Aziraphale nodded to him, and the customer returned the acknowledgement quickly then diverted his eyes elsewhere, as Londoners were wont to do. He wandered down an aisle without asking for help. That was fine, Aziraphale had something else to attend to.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Steeling himself, Aziraphale picked up the phone and pressed it to his ear. With deliberate focus, he dialed the number on the flyer. The phone rang once. He inhaled through his nose, and out through his mouth, hoping for some calm. Hoping that when the man picked up, Aziraphale would have his wits about him, that they would have some charming exchange and agree to meet up sooner than later. Perhaps the man would say </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’m so relieved, what can I do to repay you?</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Love Shop. Get fucked!” A man’s voice growled loudly from the other end of the line and Aziraphale sat back in his chair, aghast. How crude! How loud! His eyes flicked around the shop, looking for the customer who might’ve overheard.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I beg your pardon?” he sputtered.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Shite,” said the man, then it sounded as if he’d slipped his palm over the phone, but only enough to muffle the sound, not enough to block it from Aziraphale’s keen ear. The man spoke to someone on his own end. “That was a stupid idea.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A woman’s voice piped in now. “You just said it wrong. You should be peppy. Like </span>
  <em>
    <span>Get fucked! </span>
  </em>
  <span>In a cute way. Not a grumbly sort of way.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Stupid,” said the man.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Clever!” insisted the woman. “It’s cheeky.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Then the man’s voice came back clear. He was speaking to Aziraphale again. “Nevermind all that. What can I help you with?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Ah,” stammered Aziraphale, losing whatever script he had decided on, “right number!” And with that he slammed the phone down into the cradle.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He wasn’t sure how, but he was certain the person he spoke to was not the man on the bike. The gravelly voice on the other end of the phone surely belonged to someone else.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Startlingly, he knew Love Shop. It had been in the neighbourhood, about ten minutes away, since he’d come to live in Soho. After so many years it had sort of faded into the background of the streetscape to him. He’d never been in, though he understood what was inside. Perhaps the man worked there, or he had a friend who did and was using the phone number. It was somewhere to start, anyway.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He stood and gathered the bag in his arms again, swallowing and taking stock. “I’m sorry, we’re closed,” he yelled into the shop, and the lone customer emerged from between two bookshelves.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It’s only 10:45!” said the man, incredulously.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Yes,” said Aziraphale, “would you look at the time!” And he ushered the man out rather unceremoniously. Then he struck out on his second mission of the day.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With each step he got closer to Love Shop, his knees grew weaker. His hands trembled. His silly little heart skipped beats in his chest. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You are ridiculous</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he chided himself. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You know nothing about this man, except that he shows a reckless disregard for other road users.</span>
  </em>
  <span> And yet…</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And yet.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He felt so deeply that he was supposed to know this man. Supposed to be near him and care for him. To return his things would be the first step. Maybe Aziraphale would say,</span>
  <em>
    <span> you know, the Cranberries are very good. You don’t happen to be Going Through It, are you? I hear it’s quite nice to Go Through Things together.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In his revery his feet had carried him to his destination without his intervention. He stood in front of the door to Love Shop, and with one shuddering breath he opened the door. There was a bell in the shop to herald his arrival, much like in his own. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Can I help you?” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The gravel voice. Aziraphale looked up into the dark eyes of a man stocking shelves, who sported a shocking mop of white hair. It was not the man from the bike, but when he met Aziraphale’s gaze there was a flash of surprise, almost like recognition, even if Aziraphale had never seen the man before in his life, both on earth and before.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I’m here about the flyer,” said Aziraphale in a nervous blast.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Leather sale’s not ‘til next week, darlin’.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The woman’s voice came from behind a glass case, and she emerged after speaking, tall and thin and all business. Then she saw him and he caught that same expression from the white haired man on her features. Like she knew him. How strange.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“No, ah. The flyer about the bag?” Perhaps he was wrong. Perhaps this wasn’t the place he was meant to go at all.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Both of the shop clerks looked to the pannier clutched in his arms.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, fuck. </span>
  <em>
    <span>You</span>
  </em>
  <span> found it?” The woman looked stunned.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It landed at my feet. Quite miraculously, really.” Aziraphale felt his lips quirk into a small smile and he let himself glance around the store. There was quite a lot of paraphernalia. He didn’t know what most of it was for. His eyes landed on a display of what appeared to be replicas of human genitalia (and perhaps some less than human), in all sorts of sizes and colours and configurations. Suddenly, he was blushing.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Crowley’s not in at the moment but you can leave it here,” said the man.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Crowley. </span>
  </em>
  <span>The man on the bike had a name and it was Crowley. “Do you happen to know when he’ll be back?” asked Aziraphale, eyes now studiously focused on an imperfection on the tiled floor.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The man cleared his throat. “He does some food delivery through an app, besides working here. Doing a bit of that now. Might be back after lunch rush.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Perhaps, I might come back? I’d like to give it back to him myself. Just to feel sure,” he admitted. The burning in his cheeks had yet to subside.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Alright,” said the woman. “You’re a regular guardian angel.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>If there was something knowing in her voice, Aziraphale dismissed it. He sputtered some sort of farewell and left the shop as quickly as he had entered. Back in the open air, he wondered if the people passing by thought he was some sort of pervert. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Those concerns melted away as the second part of a plan began to bloom in his mind.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>(Now and then, since coming to Soho, Aziraphale would dream of a black snake with gleaming scales. It would wrap its way around his arm, hover its little head beside his ear and hiss, “Funny if we both got it wrong, eh?”)</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. La Redécouverte</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>With the bag still clutched in his arms, Aziraphale strode with purpose towards the record shop he had planned to go to earlier. He dodged tourists and locals elegantly, weaving around groups with ease and always seeming to catch intersections at the walk signal. His heart pounded, each thrum of it hitting on a syllable. </span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Crow-ley. Crow-ley. Crow-ley.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>The name fit the man, perfectly sparse but distinctive. Undeniably human. Soft consonants and vowels but with an edge to it all the same. Crowley. He let himself say it only once, let the weight of it linger on his twitching tongue before giving it air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Crowley.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He laughed to himself. Smiled and felt his cheeks ache from it. Human corporations came with some minor downsides (the occasional headaches, sore knees on rainy days) but there were few more delicious feelings than his cheeks hurting because he couldn’t contain his smile.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale came to the front of the record shop, another spot in the neighbourhood that he’d been past plenty of times but had never gone in. He leaned his shoulder against the door and pushed in, the clerk behind the counter in the front looking up briefly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hiya,” they said, with polite disinterest.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hello,” said Aziraphale, smile still in full possession of his lips.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Can I help you find something?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale looked out over the store. From the ceiling hung signs declaring different genres: rock, metal, indie, vintage country. Then, towards the back he saw the section for which he had come. “No thank you, my dear. But if I run into trouble I’ll be sure to flag you down.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The clerk smiled, in spite of themself, it seemed, and nodded.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale moved to the back of the store. Upon reaching the section he scanned the tabs with the names of musicians, organized alphabetically by last name or the name of the band or group. For a brief moment he thought that maybe there wouldn’t be what he wanted, but then, almost as if it were glowing, the name of the artist he was searching for revealed itself.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There you are,” he said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He left the shop not ten minutes later, after paying for the new acquisition, and the clerk helpfully held the pannier open as Aziraphale slipped the record inside. Upon seeing the contents the clerk also complimented Aziraphale on his taste.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, they’re not mine actually. I’m holding onto them for someone else. But I’ll be sure to pass on your kind words.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As Aziraphale left the shop, the clerk looked down to the floor beside them, and saw an unscratched scratch ticket there. They cast their gaze around them and the store was empty. Shrugging, they pulled a coin from the till and scratched the film off the card. With disbelief, they revealed their prize: ￡300. Their rent for the month was covered.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Even though he had only added a single record to the collection, the bag felt twice as heavy as it had before, now leaden with the weight of Aziraphale’s expectations. Gradually, his hurried footfalls slowed to nothing, and the reality of what would happen set in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale was an angel. Angels lived forever. They had knowledge that extended beyond the mortal realm. He could be recalled to Heaven at a moment’s notice. Humans did not live forever, and there was no way a human man could ever understand the scope of Aziraphale’s experience. To even play at this sort of thing would be a complicated ethical question at best, an immoral transgression for an angel at worst.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then, there were the more immediate, worldly concerns. Some people did not like male bodies, like the one Aziraphale had lived in for nearly his entire existence. Some people did not like the finer features that made him up — the way the skin folded under his chin, the stark white of his forearms, the softness of his belly, the unruly cloud of hair.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What if he handed the bag back to Crowley and Crowley took one long look at him, wrinkled his nose, and said “Thanks, should have just left it at the shop”? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>A knot formed in Aziraphale’s throat. He’d come to like people very much on earth. Madame Tracy, Miss Device, lovely Newton. But they were friends, or a facsimile of them. He’d had fantasies of course, of something more, but that fantasy never had a face or a name, until now. For that fantasy to crumble to pieces in front of him… no. He wouldn’t let it happen.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had to give the bag back to Crowley, that much was certain. He couldn’t hold tight to it because of fear. But there had to be another way than returning to that shop with the bright red walls and shelves of modern erotica and the store clerks who studied him with such curious expressions. There had to be another way.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Crowley entered the shop, dumped his insulated delivery bag on the floor and looked up, to Hastur and Dagon staring at him, wide eyed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What?” he asked, irritated, not particularly enjoying being the subject of a one-sided staring competition.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His colleagues then looked towards one another, and engaged in a silent debate.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What?” Crowley repeated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dagon sighed, and shot daggers at Hastur before turning back to Crowley. “Your bag,” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His heart stopped. “What about it? Is it here?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dagon didn’t speak. Hastur didn’t speak.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For fuck’s sake, you idiots. What about my bag?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At this moment Ligur emerged from the back, wiping sleep from his eyes. “What are you all on about?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Hastur cleared his throat. “Uh, someone came by with your bag.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley could’ve collapsed with relief. “Alright then, where is it?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Again, Dagon and Hastur looked to each, waiting for the other to speak. Ligur looked at Crowley and shrugged.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He, uh, left with it,” said Hastur, swallowing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley’s hands went up to his face. He took a few shuddering breaths. “You mean to tell me that some bloke showed up with my bag, then left with it, and you just let it happen?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dagon stepped forward. “It’s not like that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really? Really, Dag? Because from where I’m standing that’s exactly what it fucking looks like.” He paced through the shop, gesticulating wildly with his broad hands. “You know how hard I worked to find those! I was out half the night putting up posters and someone walks in here with my stuff and you just let them go? What’s wrong with you? Some friends you-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It was an angel!” she burst out, interrupting his tirade.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He froze, and then he felt it. That crackling warm static. That frisson of some holy grace. Like an allergic reaction or that millisecond before he, well, before he came over his hand. “An angel,” he said, not intelligently.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“In here?” asked Ligur, with equal brilliance.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Saw him with my own eyes,” said Hastur.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did he know…” started Ligur, alarmed. “Could he tell…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Who we were? Don’t think so. Think he was too distracted by…” Dagon gestured emphatically to the wall of dildos. “But it was an angel. Could smell Heaven all over him.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Stank of it,” muttered Hastur. “He can’t have been here long.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley took a breath. “So, you are telling me that an angel, a literal angel from Heaven has my stuff?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Said he’d come back. Was keen to give it to you himself,” Dagon said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“For Heaven’s sake,” murmured Crowley, leaning against the counter.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Not one of them had seen an angel for centuries. The last Crowley could remember was some brief interaction during the Crusades, a truce of sorts with a Heavenly agent to check in on who was responsible for that mess. (Humans, of course, always humans.) Then Ligur had thought he’d seen one on the underground somewhere about 1971, but it had turned out to just be a particularly beatific primary school teacher from Croydon. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>So an angel had his things, and one so without guile that he didn’t smite his colleagues on sight. He didn’t know what to do with that information.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His phone buzzed in his pocket. Automatically, he pulled it out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What the fuck,” he muttered. The food delivery app had assigned him a job, but he’d signed out after dropping off that kebab order a few blocks up. He dismissed the job, not having time for that at this particular juncture. Then from the countertop, the phone vibrated again, somehow more insistently this time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shut up,” said Crowley, opening the app to see what the issue was. The delivery request was for the oysters from Yokubo, a Japanese place that Crowley was sure was not on the typical delivery roster, given it was Michelin starred. Also, who had oysters delivered?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Weird. He tried to close it again but as soon as he did the request appeared again. He shook his head and checked the delivery location. The Barbican, which was not the area he usually delivered. There was some slow dawning realization coming to him, rolling over his mind’s eye like a fog. As a test, he dismissed the order one more time.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It immediately reappeared.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I…” he started, staring at his phone, “I’ve got to go.” He was out the door of the shop before they could ask any questions.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The chef at Yokubo seemed just as confused as Crowley was, but he boxed up the oysters on a delicate bed of shaved ice, and gave them to the demon with both hands. Crowley accepted them the same way, placing them gingerly into his delivery bag.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>On the bike ride there, as he swung around parked cars and tour groups and wanna-be cabbies on motorbikes studying for the Knowledge, his heart did incredible things inside his chest that he did not understand. But he knew the angel was on the other end of this.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He should have been scared, but he wasn’t. His veins coursed with anticipation, he was thick with it. As the concrete complex rose in front of him, the hair on the back of his arms stood on end.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He brought the bike up onto the pavement and kicked out the stand. Pulling his phone out of his pocket, the map zoomed in and the GPS marker led him forward. With the delivery bag slung over his shoulder he held the phone out in front of him, and followed where it led.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley wove through hallways, went up staircases then back down, turned his head in every which direction. Searching, searching. Then in the courtyard he realized he didn’t really need the phone at all. He could smell him. The angel.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Petricor, electricity, Earl Grey tea, and something else. Something remarkably human and humid in the air. It pinged something at the back of his millennia-long memories. His mouth went dry. There was no way, absolutely no way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He followed the smell up a set of stairs, then through a doorway when suddenly it all changed. The smell of the angel faded into nothing and Crowley was assaulted by the heady smell of verdant greenery. The intensity of it was enough to make him come to a full stop, and close his eyes a moment. When he opened them, and focused, his breath slipped away.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>How had he been in London for hundreds of years and never seen this? Was his life so little in spite of his immortality? Could he not see past his damn nose?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A conservatory, thick with plants from every corner of the planet. He took a step further, and his phone vibrated in his back pocket. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Go forward</span>
  </em>
  <span>, it seemed to say. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>With a frantic energy he bolted down the stairs in front of him, found himself plunged into a shelter of palm trees and giant ferns. Water trickled somewhere in the distance. This was familiar, this place, even though he knew he’d never set a foot inside it before. His legs drew him forward and his useless heart absolutely hammered against his ribs, aching to escape.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where are you?” Crowley whispered. “Where are you, angel?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Deeper and deeper he ran, whipping his face in every direction, looking for him, hoping, desperately, that he hadn’t got it wrong. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then it struck him and he nearly tripped over his own stupid feet. Eden. This was like the Garden. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He broke into a run and rounded a corner and there, in front of him, was a bench. A wooden thing with a little gold plaque that told you that the bench was in honour of some philanthropist somewhere. But Crowley didn’t read it because there was his bag, alone. He looked all around him. He was the only soul in the place.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He ran up to his bag, took it in hand. Opened it. His hands were shaking wildly and he could hear the huff in his breath. The records were there. He counted them, then counted them twice. There was one more than there had been before.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley looked around him again, desperate for that other presence. He couldn’t feel him anymore. Couldn’t smell him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He turned back to the bag and pulled out the record that hadn’t been there before. He held it in his hand, the black and white photo staring back at him. Max Richter’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>Songs from Before</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Crowley swallowed, and flipped the record over. With no one there to hear him, he wasn’t embarrassed when he moaned aloud at the handwritten note that was taped to the back.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Crowley, </span>
  </em>
  <span>it read in expressive script. </span>
  <em>
    <span>I’m terribly sorry for the run-around.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>I hope you don’t mind that I’ve added to your already excellent collection. I thought so myself and the record store clerk confirmed it. I listened to each album. Though I know you must have been very worried to have mislaid these, I hope you will be relieved to know that you brought someone else such joy, just for one night. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>One cannot take a night of joy lightly, and so I’ve done my best to return the favour. I’ve always thought the conservatory the loveliest spot in the whole of London.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Please, enjoy the oysters.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Yours.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>That was it. That was it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ahhh,” Crowley said, panting lightly. Then, against his earlier instincts, he left everything sitting there on the bench. The oysters, the records, but not the note, which was clenched in his fist. He ran for the nearest exit. He shoved through a fire exit and willed the alarm silent. He focused, not overwhelmed by the smell of plants now, but fighting back the sensations of the city, all around them. But he needn't have.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In the distance, he could see him, at the intersection, outside the entrance to the underground. He couldn’t forget that dandelion hair, the uptick of that nose. No longer in the robes of warrior angels, he wore a camel coat. Crowley froze. He was right. It was him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You,” he whispered.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Yours.</span>
  </em>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>(Even in this human form he could feel it, somehow still. Warm, beautifully soft hands sliding underneath his belly, gently holding him up. The pad of a thumb, stroking his side. The first tenderness he could remember receiving since he’d taken up residence downstairs. Those hands on him, and oh, those eyes.)</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Pas si simple</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>On the underground, Aziraphale could hardly contain himself. He couldn’t resist the smile that took over his features, knew he must look like a mad man by the way no one sat next to him on the train. Over and over he tried to draw his mouth into something more neutral, that blank commuter stare, but he couldn’t. He’d returned the bag successfully. Crowley had it in his hands now, along with Aziraphale’s gift.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As he reached his stop, the initial high began to wane. Crowley had the bag. And… and that was it. This little adventure had lasted a scant 24 hours and it was over. Yes, Aziraphale knew his name and where he worked, but what was to be done with that? Friendships with humans were complicated enough without being in love with them.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>In love.</span>
  </em>
  <span> The realization was immediate but certain. He was in love. He’d observed humans enough to know that this sort of declaration, made without even a conversation with the subject of it, would be considered ridiculous and unfounded to them. But he wasn’t human, was the thing. And when he laid eyes on Crowley for the very first time something in his celestial core woke up and fought its way to the surface. It knocked on his heart, his very essence, and told him the truth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley wasn’t a stranger because there were no strangers to Aziraphale. Aziraphale felt that he knew him. It was all for naught, however. They’d had their moment, or rather, Aziraphale had had his, and while Crowley had the record and the note, he wouldn’t ever know who was responsible. The whole affair would be a strange story for his colleagues at the shops, his friends, perhaps his lovers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That last thought tied possessive knots inside of him. Crowley felt so much like his, but the simple fact was that he wasn’t. How unbecoming of an angel, Aziraphale thought, to think a human could belong to you.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>From the station, his feet had carried him to the door of La Courage. It’s red door seemed a beacon in front of him, gleaming bright in a world that was suddenly dreary. Perhaps it would do him good to have a bit of company. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He pushed open the door and was enveloped by the steamy warmth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell,” called Madame Tracy from behind the bar, where she was completing a tarot reading for a customer. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He could say the same of her, with her copper hair and false eyelashes, bright makeup. Aziraphale had always thought the way the Madame looked was positively delightful, designed, perhaps unintentionally, to make the person who saw it gleeful. It never occurred to him that not everyone would feel the same way. One time he’d overheard a diner in a business suit lean over to her companion and call Madame Tracy </span>
  <em>
    <span>gaudy</span>
  </em>
  <span>. With a blink of Aziraphale’s eye, the woman had spilled red wine all the way down the front of her blazer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He slid into a booth after hanging up his jacket on one of the provided hooks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The usual?” Madame Tracy called from behind the bar.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Please, my dear. When you have a moment,” Aziraphale called back quietly. Small things. He would take joy in small things.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>The angel descended into the underground station, and Crowley’s mind reeled. Six thousand years. Six thousand years since he’d last laid eyes on him and yet he was unmistakable. The Guardian of the Eastern Gate was in London and he had found Crowley’s records, laid hands on them and gifted them back in the most remarkable way. Hastur was right, the angel hadn’t been here long. The presence he left behind him was green in its youth. Crowley breathed it in, felt it coat his lungs.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As if it had happened yesterday, Crowley could remember what it was like to have been held by the angel, to have been fairly wrapped around him. That warmth and softness. Occasionally he’d go decades without thinking of it, especially when Hell had still been keeping him busy, but when he’d slip into a well-deserved rest, just before succumbing to sleep, the angel’s hands would come to him again, firm and steady on his skin, and he’d dream lovely dreams. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of all the creatures in all the universe, he didn’t know why the angel was the only one he really wanted. But up until an hour ago, he had seemed fairly imaginary. A brief chance encounter to never be repeated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he was here. Crowley knew what he smelled like. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He suddenly realized he’d been standing frozen in the middle of the pavement, pedestrians flowing around him, casting him sidelong glances. He ran a hand through his hair, tugged at it in frustration. What would he do next?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He turned back to the conservatory to collect his things.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He ate the oysters. A strange and slippery sensation that made his nose wrinkle, but they were a gift. He packed up his things into the pannier and returned to his bike. It was exactly where he left it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The resolve came to him all at once, fully formed an inescapable. He would find the angel. Sure, London was a big city but Crowley had been everywhere, had seen nearly everything. He could find one celestial being in all of this, couldn’t he? Surely his efforts would be better than any private detective services on offer.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What did he know? The angel liked refined things, judging by the oysters and the record. He took the underground. And in all likelihood, he frequented the streets of Soho, seeing as he’d found Crowley’s bag in the first place. He’d start there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wove through traffic, his heart in his throat, his eyes cast wildly about for any sign of the angel. Crowley would know him anywhere, had known him from the back of his head and it had nearly knocked him out. He remembered what the angel had looked like when he’d turned his smiling face towards Crowley and if it happened now, Crowley didn’t know if he’d be able to remain upright. He’d be on his knees in a second, the full weight of every harboured fantasy over six millenia coming down hard on his shoulders.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What would the angel think of him? He brought the bike to a stop at a red light, something he almost never did but at this particular moment he’d come unmoored. What if the angel looked at him, saw him for what he was then smote him on the spot? He’d been so sweet in that first and only meeting, gentle in spite of knowing what Crowley was, was he’d done. But that was six thousand years ago, gave him loads of time to become a bit more conservative on the demon acceptance front.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He continued on his route, with trepidation and anxiety nipping at his heels. He searched for signs, wanting desperately to find one, terrified to know what would happen if he did. Then he cycled past the entrance of an underground station and skidded to a stop. It was there, in the air.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He knew what the angel smelled like. He knew what it felt like when the angel had been somewhere. It was strong, potent. He felt like it was re-writing his chemistry, rearranging his faculties. He was on it in a flash, couldn’t help but to follow it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Around one corner, cut through an alley, wrong way down a one way street ignoring honking cars and dismayed pedestrians.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A red door. The angel was past the red door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley abandoned his bike to the pavement and pushed his way in. A bistro bar in warm tones. Yellows and reds and browns. Scattered customers. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>In a booth towards the back, facing away from him, was the angel. His camel coat on a hook to the side. </span>
  <em>
    <span>There you are, </span>
  </em>
  <span>Crowley thought</span>
  <em>
    <span>, and here I am</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He took a step towards him and a woman spoke to him from behind the bar. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Table for one, love?” she asked cheerily, but Crowley waved her off.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He couldn’t stop now if he wanted. With each step he took towards the angel he could see his spine start to straighten, as if he could sense Crowley there, like the air was tinted with his arrival.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He came to a stop beside him, and looked down. It was him. Of course it was him, but it was</span>
  <em>
    <span> him</span>
  </em>
  <span>. Crowley could never forget the way his nose ticked up at the end, the blush of his cheeks, those pale eyelashes. Those fine, well-manicured hands, currently folded primly in the angel’s lap, were etched onto Crowley’s very core. Crowley stopped breathing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The angel was staring straight ahead, but there was no question he knew Crowley was there. He maybe stopped breathing too. He sat, perfectly, perfectly still.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley reached into his pocket, withdrew the now crumpled piece of paper. He unfolded it as gently as he could with callused hands, tipped with dark polish, and laid it down in front of the angel, on the table. His fingers shook as he did it, and he swallowed thickly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you write this?” he asked, his fingers holding the angel’s note down in front of him. Crowley cleared his throat. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>One cannot take a night of joy lightly</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” he recited, having already memorized the words, when the angel didn’t immediately respond.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Those long lashes dropped as the angel looked at the note, then his eyes darted to the side, resting somewhere on Crowley’s hips. He opened his mouth to speak, then his lovely pink tongue darted out to wet his lips. A sound escaped him, so quiet to barely be heard. A whimper, a whine. Then, “no, I’m afraid not.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley’s eyebrows stitched together. He willed the angel to look up at him but he was resolute in his refusal to lift his gaze. “Are you sure?” Crowley asked, nudging the paper closer to him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>In a move that seemed to cause him pain, the angel nodded. He wet his lips again. “I’m sorry that I can’t be of more assistance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So that was it. The angel had made a decision. Perhaps this is what he did. Maybe he was the angel of returning lost things. They had a saint for that, didn’t they? Maybe he was this creative with all his reunions. Maybe Crowley was just one of many. Whatever it was, the angel was done. Crowley’s stomach sank and his mood went with it.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He slid the paper off the table and stuffed it into the pocket of his denims. “Right. So sorry to bother you.” He turned to go but there was a flash of movement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The angel had reached out for him, but stopped himself. Still couldn’t bring his eyes to Crowley’s face. “Don’t be sorry,” he started, breathless. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Suddenly tears strung the backs of Crowley’s eyes. “Thanks,” he bit out, and fairly jogged towards the door. The angel hadn’t touched him, his hand had hovered between them, but it was like he had been struck, and he couldn’t stay, not a second longer, if he couldn’t run his fingers through that cloud of blond hair, if he couldn’t kiss the lips that the angel kept wetting.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He mounted his bike, and sped back towards the shop, heart sick.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Aziraphale sat back in the booth, heart racing, trying to escape his chest and chase Crowley out. How in the world had he found him? There was no reasonable explanation.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His hands shuddered in his lap. He’d almost touched him. He’d almost placed his hand on Crowley’s waist and he felt that Crowley perhaps wouldn’t have minded. It was like he could have had him, could have felt his body next to his. He ached for that knowledge.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A cup of tea and a croque monsieur were plopped down in front of him. “What was that about, love?” asked Tracy, looking out to the door where Crowley had left.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” said Aziraphale, unable to mask the sadness in his voice. “Just a case of mistaken identity.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really? From where I was standing he seemed to know who you were.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His throat constricted. “You know, I think I might take this home with me. I’m suddenly not very hungry.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tracy boxed up his meal and sent him on his way with a worried look in her eyes. He crossed the street and entered his building. On the first landing he looked down to the box in his hands, and couldn’t imagine ever eating the contents, not now or ever. He looked up to his left to his neighbour’s door, then knocked.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>After some shuffling inside, the squeak of someone lifting the flap to look out the peephole, the door opened, and Miss Device stood there, wide-eyed. It was the best look he’d ever gotten of her. She too, he might say, was a sight for sore eyes, though in a completely different way than Madame Tracy was. She wore a long black dress, a dark purple shawl over her shoulders. Her hair was wild and her eyes like night. But she was lovely too, with soft features. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Would you at all be interested in some lunch?” Aziraphale asked, extending the box to her. “It’s from La Courage across the street. Not touched, it’s just-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell,” she said, and her mournfulness caught him off guard. “You’re heartbroken.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He froze. “Excuse me?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She made a wide sweeping gesture with her hand. “Your aura it’s… it’s just thick with it. You really </span>
  <em>
    <span>are</span>
  </em>
  <span> going through it, aren’t you?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His mind flashed back to their interaction that morning, her calling down to him on the stairs.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I-” he started, trying to deny it. But he found he was at a loss for words.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Come in,” she said. And he did.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>(To watch the serpent go had been a loss that Aziraphale had failed to understand. How long had they spoken? Fifteen minutes, twenty? The demon’s hissing, friendly laughter still rang in his ear. Years later someone would say “parting is such sweet sorrow,” and Aziraphale would know it, intimately.)</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Sur le fil</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Would you like some tea?” Miss Device asked as she ducked into the small kitchen. Even before he answered, Aziraphale could hear her turning on a tap, filling a kettle with water.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Please,” he said faintly, eyes darting around the room. The curtains were drawn. Every flat surface was littered with papers covered with handwritten notes. Some were tacked to the wall along with pictures and drawings, maps...</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I’m writing a book,” she called from the other room. “That’s why it’s such a mess.” She came out and cleared a place on the sofa, gathering the papers haphazardly in her arms, several escaping and dropping to the floor. Aziraphale bent to collect them but she shook her head at him, depositing the other papers on the coffee table. “Don’t bother.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Aren’t you worried about losing something you need?” he asked.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She returned to the kitchen. “What I need will float to the surface when I’m ready for it. I’m trusting the process.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>When she came back to Aziraphale, she was balancing a small silver tray in her arms with two delicate china tea cups on mismatched saucers. She placed it down on the most level looking mountain of papers, and handed a steaming cup to the angel.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“So,” she said, settling onto the sofa beside him, papers crinkling underneath her. “Tell me about your broken heart.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Humans could be so charmingly forthright. They’d barely spoken before this exchange and yet here she was, inquiring about the particulars of Aziraphale’s mental state.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“There isn’t much to tell, I’m afraid. It was all over before it began.” He hoped that was vague enough. He tried his tea, which was on the right side of too sweet.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Miss Device looked pensive as she drank from her own cup. “He’s special to you though, right?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The answer was </span>
  <em>
    <span>yes</span>
  </em>
  <span>, of course. So special, and yet they’d barely exchanged words. No human could understand the way Aziraphale’s desire operated, the certainty that consumed him, that said “You know Crowley, and there is something in him that was meant for you, and you for him.” In other worlds it would be ridiculous, let alone this one.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Some things,” started Aziraphale, staring resolutely at the curtains, “are simply not possible.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Do you believe in fate, Mr. Fell?” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The question came suddenly, and Aziraphale couldn’t restrain himself from looking her full in the face, taking in her thoughtful expression.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Well,” he said, thinking of God’s Plan, the workings of the universe that he’d played audience to over thousands of years. “I suppose I do.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Gingerly, she took the empty cup of tea with the saucer from his hands and did several complicated gestures with it, finally tipping the cup over, then inverting it again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Look at this,” she said, leaning over to him. In her mere proximity, he could sense the very human beating of her heart. “This isn’t the end for you and him.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He tipped his face to her, startled, then back to the cup. “And how would you know that?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I have the gift,” she said, looking meaningfully at the leaves. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The gift,” he repeated, unsure of what to do with his hands now that they weren’t conveniently occupied with a tea cup. Ultimately, he folded them and laid them in his lap.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I can see the future,” Miss Device continued, her words laced with the confidence of a woman who had said this before and who was expecting to be rebuked. “Not </span>
  <em>
    <span>perfectly</span>
  </em>
  <span> clearly. It’s a bit fuzzy. But when I see your aura, and your leaves, I know that this isn’t your ending with him.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s mouth dropped softly open, at a loss for words.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I can feel it, Mr. Fell. I know beginnings and I know middles. I’d know if this was an end for you because I’ve been searching for one myself.” She opened her arm and acknowledged the mountains of notes that surrounded them. “I have hundreds of beginnings, and middles for days, but no ends. But I’ll know it when I see it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell -” Miss Device put down the tea cup, and took his hands in hers. They were soft and alive and wonderfully mortal. “I know an end when I see one. This is not your end. Do not walk away from him.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Then suddenly her intensity flagged. She drew back and dropped his hands, almost surprised with herself. “I’m so sorry,” she said quietly, “you must think I’m crazy.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But something in his failing heart had gotten a second wind. Her surety and seriousness, it was strange. But strange was nothing to him. For goodness’ sake, he was an angel.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“My dear,” said Aziraphale, eyes lighting up with possibility, “not crazy at all. </span>
  <em>
    <span>There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio...</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>When Crowley opened the door to the shop, they were all there waiting for him, inhuman eyes wide with nervous anticipation. No one spoke, and annoyance welled up in Crowley’s chest. He wanted desperately to be left alone. Why did he come back here when he could’ve just gone home?</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You got your bag back, then?” said Dagon, breaking the silence.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley held it up with one hand, and sneered. “Obviously.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Didja see the angel?” asked Hastur from his place beside the counter. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Yeah,” said Crowley, voice coming angry in an attempt to cover his disappointment at the angel’s rejection. “Had a real nice chat.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Really?” he asked nervously.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“No, not really!” Crowley snapped. He felt deflated, skirting on the edge of devastation. To be so close and then have a wall built so firmly between them. Life wasn’t fair, She had made sure of that, but it was a slap in the face to be reminded of how cruel it could be.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“What happened?” asked Dagon, eyes serious and voice low.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley took a deep breath, tried to centre himself. “I got the bag back. We had a very brief conversation. It’s complicated.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Could he tell who you were?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I don’t…” Crowley started, then sighed. “I don’t think so. He didn’t even really look at me.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You’re not sure, then?” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley looked up to Dagon. This wasn’t just curiosity for curiosity’s sake, there was something business-like in her expression, and something, too, of fear. He shook his head, and shrugged his shoulders minutely.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>She looked over to Hastur and Ligur meaningfully, then back to Crowley. “We had a bit of a chat, while you were away.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Oh, did you now?” Crowley sniffed, suddenly defensive.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Just hear me out,” she said, as if she’d seen Crowley’s nostrils flaring and could tell his patience was thin. “If there’s an angel in the neighbourhood there’s a chance that our respective offices are keeping a closer eye on us than we thought. Right?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Anxiety flared at the back of Crowley’s skull, bloomed into a headache. He nodded. “Right.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“And we’ve been doing okay here on our own, and we want to keep doing okay on our own. Do you agree?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Okay</span>
  </em>
  <span> was relative, but, “Yeah, sure.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“We need to start thinking about…” She trailed off, swallowed.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And suddenly Crowley understood.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Insurance,” confirmed Ligur. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>An uncomfortable silence settled between the four of them. Somewhat impossibly, this day had gone from bad to worse.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>Bolstered by Miss Device’s encouragement, Aziraphale set off the next day to watch Crowley’s shop from a distance, waiting for the man to come and go. Skulking around in the shadows made him feel altogether like a bit of a creep, but he couldn’t seem to figure out any other way. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On the first day he trailed the man from the shop to a modern looking bank of flats in Mayfair, a new build of steel and glass. He noticed that Crowley never took off his sunglasses, regardless of the weather. On a lesser man this personality trait would’ve struck Aziraphale as suspect, but on Crowley it was charming. It highlighted the cut of his cheekbones, the line of his nose.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>What Aziraphale hoped to get out of this investigation, he couldn’t say for sure. Perhaps it was that he wanted to know Crowley better from a distance. Perhaps, in spite of Miss Device’s urging, he felt that this was the only safe way to know Crowley at all. Most likely, was that in these observations he was looking for an excuse, some reason that would allow him to come forward, let Crowley in. Permission.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Even when Crowley was far ahead of Aziraphale on his bike, the angel could somehow sense the direction he’d gone. It was as if he’d left a trail of metaphysical breadcrumbs in his wake. With each step he took, Miss Device’s words rattled around in his brain.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>This is not your end, do not walk away from him</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On the second day, he restrained himself from his espionage. Instead he opened the shop, allowed himself to be distracted by a graduate student looking for an early modern guide to child rearing, an older woman hopeful for an Agatha Christie book she’d not yet had the opportunity to read. Aziraphale found he miraculously had what they needed. (The mystery-loving grandmother from Hackney never realized that the Agatha Christie book she took home with her was a previously unpublished manuscript, that no other living person had ever had the pleasure of reading.)</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Day three was peculiar. From Mayfair, Aziraphale tailed Crowley to the front steps of the cathedral in Kensington. From where he stood, it seemed like Crowley was trying to summon the courage to go inside. He’d walk up the front doors then turn on his heels and walk back down the steps. He seemed a bit lighter on his feet than usual. More alert with shoulders set back.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>At one point Crowley spoke to a woman entering, but she shook her head and appeared to want to get away from him. The same happened with a man. Extremely curious.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Then it was dark and Crowley retreated. Aziraphale did as well.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The fifth day brought Aziraphale to a coffee shop outside a cathedral in another part of the city. Again, Crowley stalked the perimeter, cautiously studying the brick building. Like the other day, he also approached congregants on their way in, and was rebuked each time.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With his hands curled around a cup of Earl Grey, Aziraphale struggled to sort out what exactly Crowley was up to. Was he a fan of architecture? Perhaps an amateur journalist? What could he be asking for that would make people so nervous of him, and why was he so cagey himself? It was an awfully strange mystery, and Aziraphale found himself nowhere nearer to knowing the man in the way he’d hoped. In fact, he felt further away from Crowley than ever.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>As the evening rush hour set in, Aziraphale decided to end his watch and he began to weave his way through the crowds back to his flat. At one point, in the cycle lane, Crowley zipped by, perched high on his bike seat. The angel froze, the anxiety that Crowley had seen him striking him square in the chest. But the man disappeared from view with nary a hesitation, and Aziraphale calmed himself. He must’ve blended in with the crowd.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Then on the morning of the seventh day, Aziraphale decided he’d visit Madame Tracy for breakfast. He’d barely come through the door when the woman waved him over, and leaned over the counter, her many bracelets clinking against the polished wood bartop.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell,” she said conspiratorially in a loud whisper. “Your young man was just here.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s all too human heart skipped a very significant beat. “I’m sorry?” he said, voice faltering.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The handsome redhead with legs for days,” she raised her highly manicured eyebrows. “Bit of an odd duck. Lucky he’s got that gorgeous face, isn’t he?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“An… an odd duck?” Aziraphale asked, not entirely familiar with the phrase but thinking he had its meaning. Crowley had come back here. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And with that realization Aziraphale could sense him, the heat he’d left behind.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Didn’t want to order anything,” said Madame Tracy. “But he did ask me if, when I had a spare moment, I’d stop by the church down the way and pick up some holy water for him. Left me his card as well.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Holy water?” asked the angel, a flare of alarm raising in his chest. Why would Crowley need holy water? Aziraphale knew some humans bathed in it in hopes that it would ease some pain, physical or otherwise. Was Crowley in pain? Could he not get the water himself? If not, then why not? The revelation left him unsteady.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I’m just so busy,” said Madame Tracy, gesturing dramatically to the one other customer in the bistro, a regular who Aziraphale knew sold himself as a paranormal investigator and smelled distinctly of microwave dinners. Then she drew a small business card from her sleeve and slid it over the bartop to him. “Perhaps you could lend him some assistance.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The card featured the name “Anthony J. Crowley” in a sans serif font as well as a London mobile number. Nothing else. Bidding a distracted farewell to Madame Tracy, Aziraphale went out to the pavement once more.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Did Crowley mean for him to get this? Should he call the number? He ran the pad of his finger over the name, feeling the ridges of the embossed lettering. Then he flipped the card over.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In chicken scratch handwriting, he read </span>
  <em>
    <span>St. Georges. Southwark</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>This was for him, after all.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale made haste for the underground, descended into the city’s belly, pressing past groups of tourists and commuters, with his mind set on the single goal of going south of the river, to the church.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley was asking for him, wasn’t he? This was a request. Oh, he was clever. How could Aziraphale not go to him, if he was so very clever?</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He boarded a train, and found a place to stand. When he reached for the pole to steady himself, his hands were shaking. He swallowed nervously. He wondered what would lay for him at the other end of this journey. He wondered what Crowley would say. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It struck him, quite suddenly, that this might be an unhappy reunion, that Crowley might demand to know why Aziraphale was following him, and the angel would find himself stuttering something about a love he couldn’t explain.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Perhaps, Aziraphale thought, this was a very foolhardy mission.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And then everything stopped.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The train stopped. The other passengers stopped. It was as if colour was slipping away from the world around him. Blood roared in his ears at the absence of all other sound. It was like nothing he had ever experienced in his entire existence. A strange heat prickled at the back of his neck, and he felt powerless against it, wanted to lean back into its curious embrace.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>From beside his ear, he heard a whisper.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Boo.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale didn’t jump. He barely moved, except to turn his head a little to the side, a little closer to that voice.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You’ve been looking for me.” Crowley’s voice, both warm and rough at the same time.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale didn’t trust his own tongue, his lips to find the words he needed, but he reached for them all the same. “Yes… I… yes.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“And you keep finding me, isn’t that a miracle?” His voice had dropped to barely a whisper. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A hand came up to ghost along the side of Aziraphale’s throat and he wanted to press into it, feel it on his skin. His eyes fluttered shut at the sensation. What could he say in the face of this want? What words would hold it?</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I needed to talk to you.” And with that, Crowley came around to face him. Aziraphale opened his eyes, and Crowley was so close. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>If he wanted, Aziraphale could reach out and cup that jaw in his palms, touch his lips to that cheek, trace the shell of that ear. He wanted. His heart hammered against his chest.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“So, I hope you don’t mind that I performed a little demonic miracle of my own.” Crowley touched the lapel of Aziraphale’s jacket so lightly, and it brought the angel crashing into the moment, out of his altered state.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“A little demonic miracle,” he whispered, brows knit together. His lips parted, he shook his head lightly. The train had stopped. The people had stopped. People just didn’t stop and neither did trains. That he could sense Crowley, sort out where he’d been, that Crowley could find him. He had come to La Courage that first time…</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Now that it had been seen, Aziraphale couldn’t unsee it. He should run away, draw some weapon from another realm, smite Crowley with all the heavenly power he could muster.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But all he could bring himself to do, was to lay one hand flat on Crowley’s chest where he could feel a dull heartbeat thud through.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Demons had hearts too. He never would have thought. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With shaking fingers, he raised his hand to the sunglasses that were a constant presence on Crowley’s face, and ignoring the grimace that crossed the man’s lips, removed them. Crowley’s eyes had shut to the angel, and he took a deep and shuddering breath. His eyelids were the faintest blue, thin and vulnerable. What would it be like, Aziraphale wondered, to kiss them.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley opened his eyes and Aziraphale gasped, and it all came flooding back to him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Eden,” the angel said, unmoving.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Eden,” the demon replied, serpentine eyes flashing.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He had held Crowley in his arms before. The serpent of Eden, whose action Aziraphale had somehow overlooked, leading to the Fall of Man.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Against the desire that was rewriting the very language of his body, Aziraphale took a step back, drew his hand away from Crowley. “No,” he said.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Angel,” said the demon, and he sounded like a man. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The hope that had lived in Aziraphale over the past seven days turned to dust. “No,” he said again. “I can’t.” He pressed the sunglasses into Crowley’s chest.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley’s miracle, his intervention, began to falter. Colour returned to the scene, the train smoothly regained its trajectory, the commuters came back to life.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And Crowley, Crowley was gone.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>(Love not at first sight, but at second.)</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thanks for reading thus far with me, friends. I had meant to update Mon/Thurs until the story was done but I've adjusted that as my work has recently become extremely busy due to <i>*gestures vaguely at planet*</i>. Thanks for your patience, and the next update will be a week from today.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. La dispute</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><span>Everything the other angels had said about him was true. Every awful thing. </span><em><span>Aziraphale can push paper, but did you see what happened when we put him on the front lines? Woof.</span></em> <em><span>What a disaster.</span></em><span> He’d been on earth not even twenty years and his most significant contribution was to fall in love with a demon. And not just any demon, not your run-of-the-mill temptress or trickster, but the serpent of sodding Eden.</span></p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale had seen Crowley leaning over the handlebars of his bike and his first reaction, rather than to draw a flaming sword from the ether and smiting him then and there, was to tumble deep into a love that could’ve consumed him, that he </span>
  <em>
    <span>wanted</span>
  </em>
  <span> to consume him. Even now, days later, deep in the recesses of the bookshop, Crowley was all he could think of.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He wanted to be angry but instead he was miserable. Disappointed, as if it hadn’t been doomed from the start, even if Crowley hadn’t been a demon. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale shelved and reshelved leather bound classics, out-of-date travel guides, mystery paperbacks with spines so cracked you could barely read the title. Maybe, perhaps, if he found the right order, the right combination, it would set him straight, rewire him. A fruitless effort, in the end.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>As customers came and went, Aziraphale’s mind focused on those tiny intimacies he and Crowley had shared - listening to the records, that snapshot of Crowley’s mind; Aziraphale’s handwritten note, pressed into the table at La Courage; Crowley’s hand, gossamer light on his neck. The latter made his hair stand on end in an all too human way.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Those broad hands, skin pulled taut over white knuckles. The dusting of iron red hair at the wrist. Long, elegant fingers. His one desire was to kiss the pad of each one, to memorize Crowley’s fingerprints, to know every line of him down to the least visible.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It was torture. He wished he could wipe the slate clean, go back in time to last month or last year or maybe a century. Back when his memories of Crowley were relegated to daydreams and visions in his sleep. It was so far away then, not just a few blocks over in a shop with a violent red sign with posters in the windows for burlesque dancers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He had tea with Miss Device, lunch across the counter from Madame Tracy. He watched Newton attempt to fix the leaky faucet in the kitchenette behind the bookshop, and when the job went on a bit too long, Aziraphale did him the favour of fixing it with a thought. The boy looked so pleased with himself that Aziraphale considered breaking more things around the shop and his flat so Mr. Pulsifer would have the opportunity to “fix” them. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yes, thought Aziraphale. He would return to these community miracles, this mystical lending of a hand, and that would be his distraction. That would be how he would press on, how he would make it through. He tried not to think about how long it would take to forget about the intensity of Crowley’s golden eyes looking into his on the underground.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That’s what he would’ve done, if not tucked in his mail some three days later, between a flyer for Chinese take-away and a letter imploring him to donate to an animal charity, was another one of Crowley’s business cards. This time, on the back was another scrawled message.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Bandstand. Battersea Park. Thursday at noon.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>That was today, and it was half past ten.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But Aziraphale wouldn’t go. Couldn’t! Crowley was a demon. And he was an angel.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He made his way to the recycling bin behind the counter and prepared to drop the card in, only to find himself entirely reluctant. The card would not leave his fingers. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from Crowley’s invitation. Was it a trick? In that moment on the underground had he seen clearly what lay inside Aziraphale’s heart and was he now just drawing him out, ready to strike?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Perhaps, but perhaps not.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yes, Crowley was a demon. And Aziraphale was an angel, but his contemporaries had been right, after all. He wasn’t a very good one.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The underground was busier than it should’ve been at midday, and Aziraphale rocked back on his heels with anxiety, not knowing what the immediate future held. The people around him stared resolutely at the floor, or their mobiles. They were, each and every one of them, the angel included, in their own worlds.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Finally, Aziraphale emerged into the dim light of the cloudy day. The sky had gone grey, it threatened to rain. It would’ve been ominous if it weren’t so dreadfully normal. This was London, after all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The park felt deserted. Another demonic miracle, or people scared of the inevitable downpour? Aziraphale’s shoulders came up around his ears as he approached the bandstand. Coming from the other direction, at the same pace, from the same distance, was Crowley. Mirroring one another. North and south, left and right, Heaven and Hell.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s chest sputtered out tight breaths as he took in Crowley’s long, dark limbs, his sunglasses that caught the barest flashes of sunlight that snuck through a brief split in the clouds.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He should feel revulsion. He should feel scorn. Something, anything other than this desperate longing that lived in him now.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He took three slow steps up the stairs into the bandstand, and Crowley did the same. The air crackled with tension.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Angel,” the demon said, and it was softer than Aziraphale thought it would be. No bite to it, not at all.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Crowley,” returned Aziraphale. He longed to close the space between them, reduce it to nothing. Was his need plain on his face, could Crowley see just how far gone he was?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then Crowley’s shoulders slumped and he stopped, scrubbed a hand over his downturned mouth. “Ah, alright. So I didn’t really think you’d show up so I hadn’t actually thought this far ahead.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” Aziraphale said. He hadn’t thought this far ahead either.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley gestured vaguely, turned his face heavensward, then brought it back down. “I guess, I… Maybe you… ngk.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The little click at the back of Crowley’s throat stirred something deep in Aziraphale’s belly. Just that shift of Crowley’s Adam’s apple, bobbing against the line of his neck. It made Aziraphale’s mouth go dry, and his tongue darted out to wet his bottom lip to compensate. Even if he’d believed he was strong against this thing, this magnetic pull, his blasted corporation would’ve given him away.</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Explain to me,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he wanted to say, </span>
  <em>
    <span>how you did this.</span>
  </em>
  <span> Tell me how you made me love you. Temptation, a deadly sin would’ve been a convenient explanation but somehow Aziraphale knew that was not the case. His love was not accompanied by otherworldly heat or the slight smell of sulphur. He was hopeless in it, yes, he had no control over his heart but that was of his own making. Not of anyone else’s. His hopeless heart was his own fault. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Tell me, please, what it would be like to hold you.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>When his lips parted, they asked a question of their own accord, leaving Aziraphale’s heart well out of the equation. “Why did you ask Madame Tracy for Holy Water at the bistro? Is that why you were loitering outside of those churches?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley grimaced. “It’s hard to explain.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Try me,” said Aziraphale, caught slightly off guard by the boldness of his tone.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley looked equally surprised, but the corner of his mouth quirked up. Almost a smile, the smallest suggestion of delight.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Alright,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “For starters, I’d say that you showing up here, s’bit unprecedented. Haven’t seen your lot about in ages. Real, proper ages.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley had begun pacing a slow circle in the bandstand, and Aziraphale matched him pace for pace. A sort of waltz, where the two dancers could not reach out and take the other.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And that you’re around,” he continued. “It’s set us all on edge, right?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Us all?” Aziraphale asked, nose crinkling. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley’s smirk faltered. “My, uh colleagues.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Colleagues?” the angel repeated.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“At the shop.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At the shop. The people at the shop who had told him where to find Crowley, who had been stunned, but very polite. “They were… are…”</span>
</p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Demons.</span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” said Crowley emphatically. “And we’ve got a decent set-up, right now. Pretty comfy. But with an angel about… we’re just taking precautions. Need a bit of insurance.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Insurance was what humans bought for their homes and automobiles. Aziraphale looked down at his fretting hands as he tried to connect the dots. When Crowley said </span>
  <em>
    <span>insurance</span>
  </em>
  <span>, did he really mean protection? Protection from what? </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But why?” he asked softly.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley shook his head, suddenly deciding this conversation wasn’t one he wanted to pursue. “It’s complicated.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale wanted to take Crowley’s face in his hands, pull his reasoning from his lips with kisses, soothe the anxious nerves that lay barely concealed under the mask of nonchalance. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As a demon, what could Crowley need protection from? Not Aziraphale, surely. He had engineered their coming together twice now, and they were so close. He clearly didn’t regard Aziraphale as a threat. But, the angel finally realized… his superiors could cause problems. He hadn’t heard from them in years but Crowley didn’t know that. But maybe now that Aziraphale was out fraternising with the enemy they could be close at hand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The thought chilled the angel to his very core. Aziraphale himself could be putting Crowley at risk. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>But why would he want Holy Water? It would do nothing against the archangels. It only destroyed demons.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It only destroyed demons...</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The realization crashed through Aziraphale, much in the way he imagined it must feel like being hit by a lorry. He stopped in his tracks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You want to… no.” His voice sounded watery, barely there.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Angel,” said Crowley, and Aziraphale nearly fell to pieces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What do you want from me? Why did you ask me here?” How quickly he had shown his hand, shown Crowley how easily he could be wounded.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley took a large step forward, rapidly closing the space between them. It seemed he was changing tack, coming at Aziraphale from another angle. “You like it here, don’t you?” he said, imploring.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s train of thought briefly hopped the track. “In Battersea Park?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley tipped his head back and groaned. “No, no. London. Earth. With them.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He gestured widely at the park around him. In the distance there was a couple walking hand in hand, a woman in a ballcap running and pushing a stroller, a group of children filling the air with high pitched giggles as they attempted to launch a kite. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s eyes lingered on all of them, and he took a deep breath.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You do,” said Crowley, and then he was closer, within reach. “See it in the way you hold things, the way you look at them. These clothes, you bought them, you didn’t magic them up.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His hand moved to touch the shoulder of Aziraphale’s coat, then withdrew at the last second, when Aziraphale thought his heart was at threat of stopping.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s not the same,” he said, because it was true. In the early days he’d hastily miracled up what could be called clothes, but they weren’t really. They didn’t feel like things he could hold. He didn’t have them laundered, or put them away at night. They didn’t feel like they belonged to him. And so he’d found a tailor, and his clothes became a small but treasured collection. Silk and cotton, herringbone and tweed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, it’s not. You’re right, it’s not.” Crowley was smiling again and Aziraphale could’ve stepped right into his arms. Crowley looked out again to the children in the park. “They’re brilliant. They’ve made brilliant things. Horrible ones too. Made our positions redundant.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Our positions?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Angel, demon, whatever. Doesn’t matter.” Crowley looked back to Aziraphale, then took off his sunglasses. It had the effect of watching one’s enemy shed his armour, and walk, vulnerable, arms open, across the battlefield. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We could be,” the demon whispered, “On our own side. All of us on this weird little planet.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>What was he proposing? “But, Heaven…”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley’s response came sharp and quick. “When was the last time Heaven gave you something to do? Think about it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale gasped. But how could he know?</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You could have a good life here,” Crowley implored. “A good forever. With the right company.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Those eyes. Those shocking and exquisite eyes. Asking Aziraphale for companionship, for forever, for -</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then the first half of their conversation came back to haunt him. “And yet you’re asking for holy water.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Insurance,” cautioned Crowley.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s small well of anger began to overflow. “Is that why you called me here? For a </span>
  <em>
    <span>suicide pill</span>
  </em>
  <span> for you and your… colleagues?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Angel -”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I won’t. I will not.” He took a step back, felt himself collide with a column of the bandstand. His hands were up and he turned his face to the ground, unable to look the demon in his face.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Angel,” he said again. A question.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I can’t,” whispered Aziraphale, for the second time that week.</span>
</p><p>
  <span> This dance they did, this reaching out and pushing back, the curve of a question mark, words on the tip of his tongue that would not, could not be spoken. He would not allow it. He pulled away from Crowley, wrenching from a grip that had not yet come to pass.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was down the steps and five feet away when Crowley called out to him</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you dream of it, angel?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale slowed, came to a stop. His hand came to his heart, which was fairly beating outside his chest in a snare drum patter. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I do, all the time. For six thousand years you’ve been showing up in my dreams. Your face, your voice, your wings. Imagined one day, if She was at all as kind as the humans think She is, that you’d show up and we could skip out on all this, go to, go to Alpha Centauri, or just… the Ritz.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Oh, Aziraphale thought. They had both been waiting for this. How disappointing it would be, when they both walked away from it, dreams spoiled. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The angel turned his face over his shoulder, not trusting himself to turn around and face Crowley head on. “I can’t be the one to lead you so close to destruction. I won’t.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He looked back to the path ahead of him, and began to walk quickly out of the park. If to protect Crowley meant staying away, then it meant staying away.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Le Moulin</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>At the edge of Battersea Park, Crowley snapped his fingers. In a flash that left his insides somehow more scrambled than they already were, he appeared at the threshold of the shop. He felt tired, exhausted, like his joints hadn’t the strength to hold him upright. He was vaguely aware that he had meant to miracle himself into his own flat, yet here he was instead. He didn’t have the energy now to try again so he pushed forward, and opened the door.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The shop was empty of customers. Dagon, Hastur and Ligur stood gathered around the till, as if waiting for him, as if they had known what he tried to do even though he hadn’t uttered a word of his plan to them.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Something happens when you know someone for a very long time, even if, maybe especially if, you are in competition. Or, if you have been told by the powers that be that your very nature makes it impossible to know, or care about, or be next to someone else. The thing that happens is that you come to understand them. You come to know that common thread, what keeps you moving, what stops you in your tracks.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hadn’t told them anything, beyond that he was trying to procure holy water. But he didn’t have to. For a few precarious days something had lit him up from within, the mere possibility of angelic proximity, and his colleagues had seen it, and they had known.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The days were long, the years were short. Decades minuscule. To be witness to something that breaks up the monotony of immortality, to see a demon you care about (reluctantly and with profound embarrassment) hold something within his fingers and then have it slip away, well, none of them wanted that. They didn’t feed on misery anymore, it wasn’t their game.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Not one of them could blame him, for wanting or for hoping. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley looked at Dagon, and if he could have let himself conjure the word, he’d have said the look on her face was sympathy.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Shall we have a drink?” she asked, tipping her head towards the back room of the shop, sleek ponytail swinging.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley’s mouth contorted into a crooked, sad smile.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” he said. Quite extraordinary amounts of alcohol might do the trick for now.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Aziraphale desperately wanted a glass of wine. Several glasses of wine. A bottle. He could go to the off-license but the young man with the smile and the flirtatious banter would be there and Aziraphale didn’t know if he could bear it. La Courage would have to do.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He’d forgotten the softness of Madame Tracy’s eyes, her “woman’s intuition” - the strength of which she liked to declare loudly and often. When he asked for a glass of wine she gave him a heavy pour, and slid it across the bartop. He meant to nod his head in gratitude, to take the stem between his fingers and have a sulk, but before he could, her arthritic hands curled around his.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s your trouble?” she asked, and Aziraphale realized with a start that she was truly asking.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” said Aziraphale. He wondered if he should wish her away, subtly create some distraction so that he wouldn’t burden her with things outside of her understanding, but he did not want to. He did not want to reject the small and simple comfort of her hand, without expectation, on his.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I had hoped for something,” he said, his gaze resolutely on the bright, glossy red of her fingernails, lightly scratching the back of his hand with care. “Dreamed of it, you see. Dreamed and hoped but these things don’t always… they don’t work out.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She leaned forward onto her elbows and the many bracelets wound about both wrists clacked against each other. “Oh, dearie,” she said, and her tone made tears prick behind his eyes.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale willed Crowley to come into La Courage now, just like he had before. To walk up to Aziraphale, say there’d been some mistake and that the two of them were possible. The Holy Water scene had never happened, and endless days of touch and wonder laid out ahead of them. He longed for the sweet civility of their very first meeting so many lifetimes ago, the question in it, the promise. The serpent wrapped around his ankles, his arms, hissing at the pulse point underneath his chin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Maybe he should have followed the serpent. Maybe he should have followed Crowley out of the park. He was all maybes, and no action.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tracy squeezed his hand. “Times are hard for dreamers, Mr. Fell.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Aren’t they,” he murmured. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She took her hands away, smoothed them over her apron, and moved to help another customer, concern still writ large on her features, obvious even with the makeup, the false eyelashes, the wig designed specifically to distract.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale finished his wine, left a hefty tip on the bar, and trundled across the street to his flat. Once inside, he sat in his chair, held a book open in his lap, and proceeded not to read it for several days.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A series of light but persistent knocks shook Aziraphale from an almost pleasant emptiness. He couldn’t forget what had happened. His memory was long but there had been so few instances of love or something like it that the short time he had spent in the presence of Crowley, as a serpent or as a man, would loom large for the next several millennia at least. But if he really tried, there were stretches where he felt almost nothing at all. Blank. Hollow. The ache could subside for a moment or two.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He didn’t know how long he’d been dissociating when the knock came, and it took him a moment to find his feet, to remember how they were supposed to work. He rose from his chair and the book that had been gathering dust in his lap fell to the floor with a dull thump. His voice was scratchy with disuse.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ah, yes? Hello?” he said, leaning his ear up to the door. He had not collected himself enough yet to even hazard a guess at who the interloper might be.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell? Are you okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Miss Device. He didn’t respond immediately, his vocabulary coming back to him in small, inconvenient pieces.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I made some soup. I haven’t heard you come or go for a few days so I thought… I thought you might be sick.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He leaned his forehead against the door. Humans could be so good, so attentive and sweet, with no heavenly intervention whatsoever, no promise of reward.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thank you, dear girl. That is exceptionally kind of you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He could hear her lingering, shifting her weight from foot to foot.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is everything okay?” she asked, voice laced with worry.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He opened his mouth, closed it. Opened it again. “I’m sure it will be, eventually. Thank you for the sou-”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is this about your guy?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her boldness took him by surprise. It was as if she already knew the answer. He couldn’t form his mouth around the word </span>
  <em>
    <span>yes</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Mr. Fell? Would you like to go for a walk with me?” Bold again, confident. It occurred to Aziraphale that he’d never seen her outside of the building. He’d never seen her outside of her apartment. “Just a little walk. Might do us both some good.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It would be too much to bear the outside as a lone soul, but with someone else on his arm, perhaps the world would spare him. He opened the door and there she stood, unruly hair pulled back and shoulders draped in dark scarves and shawls. His eyes dropped to her empty hands, and she knew immediately what he was looking for.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There’s no soup. I’m not a good cook. I just wanted an excuse to check on you. Now, come on!” Her small hand came out and wrapped around his wrist and he found himself fairly dragged out of his flat. His final move was to grab his coat from the rack and with a thought, close his door, forgetting that a door shutting seemingly on its own might rouse suspicion in even the most devil-may-care humans. Though, if Miss Device noticed, she did not say. She simply took him down the stairs with her and pulled him out onto the pavement.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her pace was quick and he struggled for a moment trying to match her speed. Her arm looped through his, and she held him tight against her as they wove through tourists and travellers and locals as a unit. She seemed to know where she was going and so he let himself be led, grateful to not be making the decisions.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was something radiating from her, some energy that was bright and alive and relentlessly human. He’d heard someone say before that emotions are contagious, and he understood it now as her excitement pressed into him, through her fingertips on his arm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Look,” she said, in a heightened whisper, her breath ghosting over his cheek. Her eyes were pointed in the direction of a woman with an arm full of bouquets, an explosion of colour, flowers from every corner of the globe. Her brown eyes gleamed from over them. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where could she be going?” Anathema asked, more to strike a mood than to request an answer. “I think it’s a birthday. A milestone. For her sister? Yes, her sister is turning forty and they’re having a celebration with flowers and champagne and stories.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There was no way to know, for either of them, but Aziraphale imagined Anathema was right, that she could look into the woman’s eyes and see the love that lay in front of her.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They turned a corner, arm in arm and Anathema spotted her next target. “See them?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Two men walked holding the hands of a small child between them. They picked the child up and swung her and she squealed in delight, her little legs kicking out into the air, the very picture of glee. The men smiled so broadly it shouldn’t have been possible.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“They’d almost given up,” said Anathema, close to his face. “They wanted a child so badly but they cards weren’t in their favour, and then she arrived when they least expected it. She turned their lives upside down and they’d do it a thousand times over.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The child’s peals of laughter faded into the distance as Trafalgar Square opened out in front of them. In the distance Aziraphale and Anathema watched as two people spotted one another from across the public space, began to walk towards each other, recognition shaky. But then it was as if a switch had been flicked. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Oh, I do know you. You are who I was looking for. </span>
  </em>
  <span>And they ran, bounded into each other's arms, holding on as if for dear life.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“They have been waiting years to meet,” said Anthema, as if she were the highest authority there was. “But they have loved each other from the start.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her hand had found its way to his and he squeezed it, grateful for these gifts she had bestowed upon him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She pulled him along through narrow alleys and busy streets. Past pubs where old mates met over a pint every Thursday evening, rain or shine, even with kids and jobs and obligations. Past an adult child pushing their parent in a wheelchair, getting groceries at the stores they liked best, where they could no longer reach the higher shelves. Past teens roughhousing and taking pictures of themselves flashing peace signs and telling each other “Oh, you look incredible in this pic. Bloody gorgeous.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They stopped outside of La Courage and looked into the steamy front window. Madame Tracy wiped down the counter, bantered with customers, threw her head back in a full throated, full hearted laugh, the only kind she knew how to give.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“See her?” said Anathema, quiet and leaning into him. “She has been doing this for twenty-five years. She has made a home on those barstools for kids with no home to go back to, people who sit for long hours on street corners, the lost and lonely and broken hearted. A home for people who are far from where they started.” Anathema squeezed his hand meaningfully. “She has opened her door and said </span>
  <em>
    <span>take courage here</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Anathema turned to him, but he could not bring himself to look into her face, the tears were so close to the surface. Instead he studied her reflection in the paned glass window, with La Courage stenciled in red and yellow cursive, writ through the centre of their mirrored bodies.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Love takes courage, Mr. Fell,” she said. “It is a brave thing to love another soul, to accept all the risks that come with it. To trust someone with our hearts.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale took in a breath, looked past her reflection into the bistro, and played in his mind his meeting with Crowley there. The note. The question.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“But how do you know?” he whispered.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You just sort of do. You have to trust it.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And he did know, didn’t he? Had always known.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can’t hide from it,” she said. “It doesn’t stop at closed doors. That makes it sound a little spooky, I guess, but it’s not. You can waste time trying to hide from it, Mr. Fell, or you can let it live in you. You can give it a home.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He turned to her then, finally. When their eyes met he had the strangest sensation that she knew more than he thought she did. That maybe she did know the future, perhaps she was steering him towards the only choice, her role in this a sage guide.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Or perhaps, just maybe, she was a very brave girl.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Thank you, my dear,” he said, not trusting himself to say more, to not give everything of himself away. He brought her knuckles to his lips and kissed them softly, chastely. A quiet blessing, of which he wasn’t sure himself what lay within.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They walked back to their building in companionable silence, not hearing the honks of cars nor strangers talking loudly on their mobile phones. She opened the door to their small lobby where the post boxes were, and let it shut behind them. The sounds of the streetscape were muffled to nothing, but instead of the silence they anticipated, the imperious voice of the landlord, Mr. Ross-Hampton, filled the space.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Anathema Device,” he blustered from his spot on top of the landing, in front of the door to Miss Device’s flat. “Don’t look so shocked. You know why I’m here.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’ll have the rent tomorrow,” she said, the magic in her voice transformed into determination. “I’m only two days late.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Two days late is as good as never in my books.” The hateful man thumped down the stairs, face red with self righteous anger. He walked up to her and waved a finger in Miss Device’s face. “And don’t get lippy with me, sweetheart. I know you’ve overstayed your visa and I could have the Home Office here to take you away at any second.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale decided he’d had quite enough of that. Surprising all of them, most of all himself, he reached out and wrapped his hand around Mr. Ross-Hampton’s wrist, grazing the cashmere sweater, the knock-off Swiss watch. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Now,” the angel said. “Is that entirely necessary?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Something came over the landlord, a mysterious calm that made his usually sharp gaze go fuzzy, his normally acid tongue go slack. “No,” he mumbled. “It’s not.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Miss Device will provide you with her rent when it is available to her, and she is to live peacefully and undisturbed in Unit 1 for as long as she pleases.” Aziraphale’s voice was calm, even sweet. It suggested nothing of the fierceness of his gaze, the concentration he exuded.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” said Mr. Ross-Hampton, the corner of his mouth quirking up into a curious smile. “Yes, I believe she will.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale dropped his wrist, and he and Miss Device parted to let Mr. Ross-Hampton exit. </span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>A funny thing happened to Mr. Ross-Hampton after that encounter, of which he had no solid memory. For the rest of his life, he would find things that he had set down slightly to the left of where he’d put them. A pen, a cup of tea, his car keys. He would reach out, and find the item not where he was sure he’d put it down, but to the left. In a decade, once he began to adapt to this phenomenon, he would reach to the left, but find objects had migrated further left still. Then, in his golden years, living off his investments, sending twenty pound notes in birthday cards to grandchildren who only occasionally called, his things suddenly appeared to migrate to the right. He never figured it out.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Miss Device, for her part, did not pay a cent of rent for the remainder of her life, and never received any trouble for it.</span>
</p><hr/><p>
  <span>Back in his flat, Aziraphale was filled with a new, determined energy. She had said that love takes courage. She had said to trust it. She had said to give it a home.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There were a million reasons why he should stay put, stick to his previous plan of action of sitting quietly in his flat or his shop until Heaven intervened. There were a million reasons why after their encounter at the bandstand, he should never talk to Crowley again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And yet she had said that love takes courage. She had said to trust it. She had said to give it a home.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>There would be fear in it, but of course there would be. Love wouldn’t be brave, otherwise.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Before that, before he dove head first into this new world he needed to know one thing. Just the one.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale picked up the rotary phone in his flat, though he didn’t dial it. It simply rang an ethereal tune which the average human might think reminiscent of the song </span>
  <em>
    <span>Edelweiss,</span>
  </em>
  <span> from a classic musical often shown on television at holidays, starring the creature possibly most favoured by God above all: Julie Andrews.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>At the second verse, the song abruptly stopped as the phone was picked up at the other end. A terse but upbeat voice came through the line, into Aziraphale’s ear. “The Archangel Gabriel.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, em, Gabriel. Is that you?” It had been awhile.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes, speaking?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh, well, yes. It’s Aziraphale.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A thick silence fell over the call. Then, “Who?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale smiled. “Principality. Former Guardian of the Eastern Gate. More recently Miracles Record Clerk 1H55T? </span>
  <em>
    <span>Most</span>
  </em>
  <span> recently your man in the United Kingdom?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Archangel Gabriel cleared his throat. It sounded like he was shuffling papers on his desk, clicking furiously on a mouse. “Uh, right, right. Yeah, okay. Aziraphale, of course. How’s… how’s it going down there?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale grinned. Gabriel had no idea who he was. “Very well, thank you. Very busy, lots to do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes, lots happening earthside these days, I hear.” Gabriel chuckled uncomfortably. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Did you get my reports?” Aziraphale tried and he could almost hear Gabriel’s alarm.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Reports?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ah, yes. Miracle counts and tallies. Details of blessings. This and that.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He could hear Gabriel swallow. The Archangel he knew as a colleague would hate to be caught unaware, would hate to be found out as someone who hadn’t kept track. “Right, of course. The reports.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The reports,” Aziraphale responded, holding back the giddiness that threatened to overflow. He had never, not once in his earthbound life, sent a single report.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Excellent reports. Really top notch. Excellent work down there, Azra-full.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh,” said Aziraphale. “Thank you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, thank </span>
  <em>
    <span>you</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Gabriel laughed nervously. “Was there anything else?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Oh no. Oh no no. Just wanted to make sure they got to you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Fantastic. Thanks so much for your due diligence. You’ve got great initiative, Ezra.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” said Aziraphale. “I suppose I do.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He hung the phone back in its cradle, and he began to laugh.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Crowley had been right. He’d been right about Heaven not watching him. He hadn’t received orders from Heaven in years, and it was because they’d </span>
  <em>
    <span>forgotten he was here</span>
  </em>
  <span>. To have an angel on the ground here was merely a formality, a box they had to tick. They had not watched him, they had not kept track. They’d sent him down and crossed their fingers. Why, the angel that was here before probably slipped away in the dead of night, to live an existence more suited to how they pleased.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>No one Upstairs would follow-up with him. They’d simply pat themselves on the back that he was still on the leash.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But he wasn’t.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He was vibrating with the possibility of it: a life here, unexamined by anyone except himself. And God, perhaps. She hadn’t intervened yet, and so this, the choice he made now could be the right one, or at least not the wrong one. The choice he made to trust, to be brave, to make a home, to welcome love in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Aziraphale entered his kitchen and turned on the tap. He let the water run over his fingers, cool and heady, as if he had never felt water before. It felt like the first time. Each breath felt like the first, each second a joyous new day.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He opened the cabinet beside him, and inside was a tartan patterned thermos where there hadn’t been one before. He took it out, and filled it up.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0009"><h2>9. Le Banquet</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>(What makes water holy? </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>There is no committee that declares it so, no best practices or guidelines. No state mandated stamp of approval. What there is, is belief. Water is holy because the holder believes it to be. Things are sacred because we regard them so. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>We make things sacred not simply by placing them on altars, or enshrining them in glass cases and bowing down, but by believing them sacred. And what is belief, if not love? </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>We create the sacred not with our mind, but with our heart, the beating, pulsing, illogical thing that persists in each of us. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>What makes water holy, is love.)</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>From the glass top counter of the shop, Crowley’s phone pinged loudly and vibrated. Hastur glanced at it over his month old copy of the Daily Mirror, then went back to reading about the exploits of backbench politicians and second tier footballers. It pinged again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Shut up,” he muttered.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The device pinged and buzzed a third time, in defiance.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Come and get your stupid phone,” Hastur growled into the back room.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley emerged from the beaded curtain just in time for Hastur to pitch the phone at his chest. In his haste to catch it, it fell from one hand to the next, gravity taking hold until he finally got a firm grasp on it somewhere around his knees.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Who’s texting you anyway?” asked Hastur, not actually interested, simply annoyed. “Everyone you know is here.” He tilted his head towards the back, where Ligur and Dagon were watching Coronation Street, which Crowley had also been reluctantly enjoying before he’d been summoned out front.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley pushed his sunglasses up halfway on his forehead and stared at the screen. “S’not a text,” he grumbled, vexed that Hastur was on the money as to the limits of Crowley’s social circle. “Delivery app. Thought I turned it off, though.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The notification was alerting him to a pick-up. He dismissed it. Some other poor sod could cycle in London traffic in the rain to pick up some yuppie’s soggy pad thai. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>But then the notification popped up again, insisted, and he knew. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley had spent days in a red wine tinted sulk, a well deserved one, he’d thought, with his colleagues being surprisingly indulgent of his whinging (as indulgent as demons could be with one another). </span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>That was it,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he’d thought morosely, sick with the idea of quiet nights alone for the rest of eternity. He’d have Dagon, and Hastur, and Ligur. Probably Coronation Street too, that didn’t appear to be ending anytime soon. But there would be no chance at those precious intimacies he dreamed of, no chance to have them manifest.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Unless. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Unless unless unless</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Unless there was a notification on his phone that refused to be ignored.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I have to go,” Crowley murmured, eyes glued to the screen. A map unfurled in front of him. A green line highlighting the way.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You’ve got to mind the shop! My shift’s done in fifteen,” complained Hastur, throwing his tabloid down.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Got to go,” Crowley said again, pushing the door open with the bell ringing above and Hastur’s cries of objection fading behind him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In his ears, his heartbeat roared. He jumped on his bike, and pushed off the pavement, his phone in the stand on the handlebars in front of him. Putting it there was a force of habit. From the moment he’d seen the location, he knew that he wouldn’t need directions. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He wove through traffic, lights changing before him, feet moving on the pedals faster than any bike courier in the city, the country, and probably the world. Red buses and tour groups left in his wake, buildings passing in a blur. The only goal in his mind, the pick-up location. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>When he finally arrived, his lungs heaving with effort, he let the bike clatter to the pavement, interrupting the flow of pedestrian traffic. No one questioned him. He jogged forward, and an ancient section of London’s roman wall rose in front of him. The space at the foot of it, usually riddled with tourists and salarymen passing through, was miraculously clear.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>In front of the glass barrier that protected the historic wall from people who would scribble their initials onto it or drunkenly climb it to impress their mates, stood a lone thermos. With each step Crowley took towards it, he could taste electricity on his tongue. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He paused in front of it. A small thing, only enough for a cup of tea or two, and yet it seemed massive. Energy came off it in waves. Crowley cast his gaze around for a moment, looking for the soul who had left it, but there was no one. There wasn’t anyone around him now, angelic or otherwise. There were no witnesses to this collection.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>With a deep and grounding breath, he picked up the thermos, and the note tucked underneath. It was wrapped with a tartan pattern. Beige and blue and gold. Crowley’s memories flashed back to the exchange on the underground, when he had unstitched the very fabric of reality for the chance to lay his hands on the Guardian of the Eastern Gate. His fingertips had fluttered against the angel’s pulse, had brushed against a bowtie of the very same pattern he held before him. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The water inside was holy, new, thrillingly bespoke. Crowley resisted the urge to hold the thermos to his chest, and unfolded the note.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Please,</span>
  </em>
  <span> it entreated, </span>
  <em>
    <span>do take care.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley had never wanted to </span>
  <em>
    <span>take care</span>
  </em>
  <span> so badly in his whole damned existence. He looked up to the wall in front of him, and it was almost as if he could see the angel standing there in the white robes of the beginning. He could almost see himself, onyx scales and ruby underbelly, looped around the angel’s arms. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The beginning. Another one.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He returned to his bike and placed the thermos carefully into the (firmly secured) pannier.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The angel hadn’t left a return address. But Crowley didn’t need it. He knew an invitation when he saw one. He knew in every fibre of his being, every string, every atom.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Hope revived and dashing through his veins, he took off back towards Soho.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale walked along the city streets deep in the valley of his own thoughts. He had originally decided he’d wait at the wall, hand the thermos over himself. Place it directly in Crowley’s arms. But there was the chance, of course, that after their last encounter at the bandstand, that Aziraphale had alienated himself from Crowley too profoundly, had put too fine a point on his position at that moment. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale had come round, but in the days that had passed Crowley’s heart could’ve hardened against him. It wouldn’t have been fair to directly ask Crowley for forgiveness, though that’s what he was doing with the holy water. The tartan thermos was a plea: </span>
  <em>
    <span>forgive me, please. I have known fear for so long that I couldn’t see around it. I have only ever known faith in the Above, never in those who stood beside me. I am sorry.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>That was the message in the thermos. Aziraphale was confident that Crowley would hold it and know. He would understand. Aziraphale had faith in that. Not </span>
  <em>
    <span>Faith</span>
  </em>
  <span>, of course, not the official business. The homegrown kind, the kind that only blooms on earthly plains. But even angels couldn’t predict the future. He did not know the status of Crowley’s previous offers. The demon was under no obligation to forgive.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale may have to live with that. But he would know that he had offered, that he had left the door unlocked, ajar, should Crowley want to come through it.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Yes, he had faith that Crowley would find the thermos and that he would understand. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He reached the front door to his building, and looked over his shoulder at La Courage. Through the front window, Madame Tracy’s pink wig bobbed as she laughed and served drinks, bright red lips curled into a genuine and full-hearted smile.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Take courage here.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He climbed the stairs to his flat and paused at the landing in front of Unit 1. He did not knock, he hadn’t the capacity to have a conversation as his mind was devoted to the thermos and the wall and Crowley, but he pressed his fingers to the door, and could sense Miss Device on the other side.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span>Take courage here.</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>
  <span>On his way up the final set of stairs, he swallowed, and considered the least desirable outcome. Crowley would find the thermos, that was certain. But then he could go back to his shop, give Aziraphale’s thermos to his demon compatriots, and use it for purposes outside of what the angel could or wanted to imagine. Crowley would think nothing of Aziraphale again, and Aziraphale would live with the knowledge that his one chance at love was only several city blocks away, and had chosen forever without him. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He would bear it. He could live with the consequences of his decision. And the world was beautiful, wasn’t it? There would always be joy to be found, if only he looked.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He entered his flat, and closed the door. He hung up his coat, slipped off his shoes, placed them neatly to the side. He made a move towards the kitchen, to make some tea, which is what he knew people to do when they didn’t know quite what to do.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And then there was a knock at the door. Three sharp raps. The most blessed sound he had ever heard.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“It’s open,” he heard himself say.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The hinges creaked, and Aziraphale stood with his back to who had entered. His breath caught in his throat.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Should I say thank you?” asked a voice, tentative, hopeful. Deep and rasping. The only voice he cared to hear ever again.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale released his breath, clasped his shaking hands to his chest. “Better not,” he whispered. “I think, perhaps, you were owed it. After everything.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The door slid into the latch. He heard the click of the lock. His knees almost gave out. Aziraphale desperately wanted to turn around, but he couldn’t make his limbs cooperate.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I think,” said the voice, quiet and otherworldly, “that we have an understanding, you and I.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>He was right behind him, inches away. Aziraphale could feel hot breath on the back of his neck. He could collapse into him, feel the sinewed chest against his back, if he wanted. (He wanted. He wanted.)</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Humans take care of themselves pretty well. Sins and blessings? We help out now and then, but for the most part they’ve made us redundant.” The voice chuckled. Then broad, warm hands with fine boned fingers came to sit lightly on Aziraphale’s arms. There was a question in the touch. The voice was waiting for Aziraphale to pull away, to change his mind. The angel pressed into the hands. It burned, spectacularly. It was exquisite.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Who knows what the folks in charge have in store for us? Who knows what time we have left here? So, perhaps we could just… do what we like.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s eyes closed, then opened. The hands gripped just that much tighter, binding him to this moment, inscribing it on the very core of him.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“What we like,” Aziraphale repeated, like it was a prayer.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The voice nosed at the nape of his neck, lips ghosted on the sensitive skin there. “I could kiss you,” he whispered. “If you like.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Aziraphale’s body came back to him all at once. Slowly, deliberately, he turned. Crowley’s golden eyes stared into his, and it was the whole world. Aziraphale’s chin dipped in a shallow nod, and the sound of Crowley’s sharp inhale turned him over inside. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley placed his hands on the side of Aziraphale’s face, his gaze open and vulnerable. Aziraphale placed his hands on Crowley’s chest. He felt the warmth of him through his shirt, the rapidly beating heart under his palm.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley’s chin tilted up, and with the gentlest pressure, he kissed Aziraphale’s brow. It was the first kiss the angel had ever received, and he memorized the drag of Crowley’s lips against his skin, the gorgeous buzz it left behind. </span>
  <em>
    <span>Again,</span>
  </em>
  <span> he wanted to say, but Crowley knew, and kissed his cheek. Aziraphale moaned, unafraid and broken open. His fists bunched in Crowley’s shirt.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The tip of Crowley’s nose brushed against his own. His eyes like molten gold. Crowley’s thin, pink tongue darted out to wet his lips.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The demon smiled, and it was the most beautiful thing God had ever made.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley cleared his throat. “What’s your name?” he asked.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>A delighted, but quiet laugh escaped Aziraphale’s mouth. Oh. Goodness. “Aziraphale,” he murmured.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Aziraphale,” said Crowley, and the angel brought his arms around him and kissed him, almost like he knew how.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And it was easy, and it was good, and he suddenly knew that the whole world turned on their desire.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>At La Courage, the arthritis in Madame Tracy’s hands eased, the pulling of pints much less of a chore than it had been just moments earlier.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Under a sink in Unit 2, Newton Pulsifer fixed a dripping pipe on his first try, a mystified smile passing over his lips.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The coffee from the ancient coffee maker in the back room of Love Shop &amp; Cinema made coffee that was “decent, actually,” for the first time in its existence. Dagon poured two extra cups, and brought them to Hastur and Ligur in the front.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And in the apartment below, Anathema Device startled, knocked over a stack of papers, and she began to write furiously in the margins of a telephone bill. She knew with unquestionable certainty the ending to her story.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Crowley kissed Aziraphale. Aziraphale kissed Crowley, wrapped his arms around the one creature in this world and beyond it that he could love, and be loved by, in the way he had dreamed.</span>
</p>
<hr/>
<p>
  <span>(Love makes water holy. That we can love something mundane and commonplace into becoming sacred? A miracle. That we make something sacred, just by regarding it so, is one of the greatest gifts we can bestow. And if you have loved, have been loved, maybe you are holy, and maybe I am too.)</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I owe a great debt to a commenter on another story of mine for this chapter. betweenbreaths said "the assurance that love in itself is an act of devotion, that the things we regard as sacred are made so simply by virtue of being loved" and I think about it every day. Thank you.</p>
<p>Thank you for reading, and lending me your attention at a time when attention is in short supply. Merci beaucoup. Apres la pluie le beau temps.</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Each of these chapters is named for a song on the beautiful and timeless Amelie soundtrack, largely composed by Yann Tiersen. Give it a listen.</p><p>racontez moi des histoires à <a href="https://bestoftheseekwill.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>/<a href="https://twitter.com/_seekwill">twitter</a></p></blockquote></div></div>
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